


The law of change and the lack thereof

by Irisinally



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Background canon pairings, F/M, Family, Friendship, Gen, Humor, but hey this is mostly a gen fic so there you go, percy and harry are cousins, prophecies are the demigods' nightmare, the demigods try not to fuck shit up too much, we'll see if they're successful or not
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:41:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 39,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25529848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Irisinally/pseuds/Irisinally
Summary: After the Second Giant War, Percy just wanted a break. Because of that, his mom decided to visit her family back at Britain.It was just his luck that his cousin was some other kind of special. With the discovery of wizards, a new mythological mystery that could very well be good or bad and Camp Half-blood taking part in some kind of magic games, Percy's break was completely ruined.Absolutely perfect, isn't it?
Relationships: Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Hermione Granger & Harry Potter & Ron Weasley, Percy Jackson & Harry Potter
Comments: 136
Kudos: 823





	1. Playing hide and seek with an airplane so Zeus doesn’t kill me

**Author's Note:**

> Hi there! This is my first pjo and hp fic, so let's see how it goes. It has been in my wips for a few months. It's time to release it into the world.  
> I've changed the timeline a bit to make it all fit, but eh *shrug* This fic will be from Percy and Harry's pov, so have fun with their sense of humor. I sure did writing it.  
> (Also, English is not my first language, so if you see anything fishy, just tell me, please!)

The fact that he had survived two wars at the age of seventeen explained perfectly well why nothing could faze him anymore. 

Sure, his mom was a few months pregnant, which had been a _huge_ bombshell that had been dropped just a day after his return from the last quest-turned-war-again. Sure, there was now an old woman living at the apartment in front of theirs who dressed her dog like a baby and liked to blast classic rock all afternoon. Sure, the Stolls had managed to pit the Ares cabin against the Hypnos cabin - for science, they said - which resulted in a weird conflict of even weirder dreams for both parties.

Sure, his mom - apparently - had family in Great Britain that he had never known about.

It had only been a week since their return from Greece, from the war with Gaea. Percy still had some injuries from it, a new collection of scars and new nightmares that plagued his dreams. After all, it was impossible to stay the same after you see literal Hell with a capital H and Hell itself sees you and tries to kill you, as if it was some kind of childrens’ play. Annabeth could corroborate. 

In any case, they were back. They were back _alive_ . He still had trouble believing it. He was still paranoid that a God or Goddess or whatever would drag them back to some kind of conflict that would mean certain or probable death, even if that conflict was something like- _poker_. His hands still shook when a neighbour made some abrupt noise that startled him, his eyes still searched for threats that didn’t exist and his scars itched as if they would open if he moved wrong. 

He tried to deal with it, of course. He learned how to deal with the inevitable panic attacks, he knew how to help Annabeth herself through hers - as did she. More or less. They tried. It wasn’t anything uncommon at camp anymore, anyway, so mostly all of them knew how to help each other and knew when they needed some space to deal with… everything. That didn’t mean that it was easy. It was a million times more difficult than going against their enemies the first time. His mom, Paul, Chiron- the adults told them that it would get easier. Percy wasn’t that convinced, but he didn’t really have another choice, did he? 

They had dealt with so much that month, Percy found himself just laying on the couch for hours a lot of days. He was usually with Annabeth, curled up against each other, trying to watch a movie. Both of them liked to be active, though, so they always ended up getting up and taking a walk. It was… nice. Yeah, sometimes there were monsters, sometimes they didn’t talk much because it was one of the bad days, one time they even ran into some of Percy’s schoolmates and they had to scramble to make up some kind of family drama that explained why he had lost more than half of his school year. 

Annabeth and him alternated their time between Sally and Paul’s apartment, which always meant good food and calm, and Camp Half-Blood, which always meant chaos and yells as they fixed the damage done by the war. That meant having to divide tasks. That was always… interesting. 

It was after one of those meetings, when Annabeth and Percy decided to just go back to the apartment to clear their heads of insults and threats of physical violence, when they overhead Paul and Sally speaking in quiet tones from the kitchen. Annabeth and Percy shared a look, trying to stomp out the anxiety that always appeared when there was something they didn’t know about, and creeped towards the kitchen as silently as they could with their backpacks stuffed with clothes and, in Annabeth’s case, drawing tools. 

“-they need it, Paul,” was saying his mom and Percy grimaced at the worried tone of her voice. Did she learn about the nights when he couldn’t sleep and just sat on the couch staring at nothing? Did she learn about the details of what happened at-?

“You’re pregnant, Sally,” continued Paul, shaking his head. Percy frowned. Okay, that was… confusing. 

“It’ll be fine,” pressed Sally. She reached out and took one of Paul’s clenched fists with gentle hands. She smiled. Paul arched an eyebrow at her. “Really, it will be. It’ll only be… what? One week? And we won’t do anything strenuous, I’ll rest as often as we can, okay?”

“I’m still not sure…” sighed Paul. 

There was a lull in the conversation and, after a quiet question at Annabeth, both of them nodded and straightened out, acting as casual as they could while tired and with obvious bags under their eyes from lack of restful sleep. 

“What are you two talking about?” asked Percy and he hoped that his voice had his usual dry humorous tone to it, but he was quite sure that it didn’t. 

Sally turned to them, smile still in place. Percy hid a sigh of relief. It couldn’t be too bad, then, right? 

“Percy, Annabeth, how do you feel about a family trip to London?” she asked. 

…

“A trip?” asked Will, curious, as he bandaged a new camper’s arm. “To London? Isn’t it… you know, a little too soon from… that?”

Percy sighed from his perch on a nearby table, arms crossed. He fidgeted with Riptide, turning the cap around and around without uncaping it all the way. 

“My mom thinks it’ll be good for us,” he explained. He could feel the camper’s curious eyes on him. A satyr had brought her just three days before and, honestly, Percy still didn’t know her name. He had to get around to that; what kind of counselor was he? “And actually, I think she might be right.”

“Really?” hummed Will. He smiled at the little girl and pointed to the candies that one of his siblings had left laying around, with a conspiratorial shine in his eyes that reminded Percy of the Stoll brothers. The little girl returned his smile and jumped from the chair, running to get her hands on the candy. Will turned to him, finally serious. “Wouldn’t it be too… I dunno, sudden? It’s only been, what? A bit over two weeks?” 

_Just two weeks._

“I think that’s the thing,” said Percy. “I mean, we’ve been working on the repairs around here. Every time we take a walk around the city we see something that wasn’t there before. It’s just… there’s a lot of stuff around here that reminds us of… what happened, I guess.”

Will nodded slightly, thoughtful, as he stuffed the bandages and other medicines in the box that acted as the temporary first aid kit while Leo went wild with making new and more “practical” furniture for all cabins. 

“I mean, I’m not your doctor or anything, I don’t even think I could qualify as your therapist,” joked Will with a rueful smile as he turned around to look at him. “I’m just saying, don’t go overboard with this.”

“I understand, _mom_ ,” answered Percy. A lopsided grin found its way to his face. He put Riptide back in his shorts’ pocket and jumped off the table. “Thanks for your opinion, though. All this… I guess I’m still trying to find my footing. Annabeth too, actually. I can tell.”

“Hey, you’ve been together ever since you first came here when you were twelve,” nodded Will. His eyes shone with amusement. “Did you know that we had a bet-?”

“Have fun with Nico, Solace,” interrupted Percy, walking towards the open door. His grin widened when he heard how the son of Apollo spluttered and tried to yell at him. 

He avoided going anywhere near the new Ares cabin, if only because he could hear a lot of noise coming from its general direction and he wasn’t sure if it was just the usual Ares cabin happenings or if it was some kind of fight. With the Ares cabin, sometimes it was both. 

Instead, he walked around the edge of the forest, almost expecting to run into Juniper or Grover himself, seeing as he had returned a few days before and proceeded to squeeze the daylights out of both Percy and Annabeth while he bleated and talked at the same time. Then again, the two of them had said something or other about having a long-overdue date, alone, so actually, Percy was glad that he hadn’t run into them at all. 

Jason and Piper were visiting New Rome to help Frank and Hazel, so there weren’t a lot of options. Still, he would IM them that night and tell them of their trip. He was tempted to go see how Leo (and Calypso) were doing with their inventions, but then remembered what had happened last time and decided that it was much safer if he just went to sit with Annabeth. He had left her at the beach, pouring over the blueprints of the new temple for the Athena parthenos and the new and larger cabins. His relationship with Calypso was still… weird, anyways. Annabeth was always a good choice. 

And there she still was, head still bowed over her notebook with her gold hair tied into a messy ponytail and with her hand stained with grey from the pencil she was twirling between her fingers. She lifted her head as soon as he came close, before smiling slightly and returning to her work. Percy plopped down on the sand next to her, with his legs stretched out in front of him. He tilted his head and gave a low whistle. 

“That looks amazing,” he commented. Annabeth shot him a short glance, before glaring at the drawing on her lap. She bit her pencil. 

“There’s still something missing, though,” she said, voice disgruntled. She glared harder. “We almost died because of it, I refuse to have something less than perfect guarding it.”

Percy snorted softly and bumped his shoulder with hers with a small grin. It _did_ look amazing, though. It had the greek columns, the stairs, the tall altar guarded by beautiful owls that seemed to look into your soul, the floor decorated with a few drawings of olive tree branches that hugged the stone.

“Well, we’re visiting London in a few days,” he said with a shrug. “Maybe it’ll inspire you.”

“The architecture is quite different there, you know,” said Annabeth, but she was smiling with an amused glint in her grey eyes. Then she sighed and looked back down. “But you’re right. It’s different, so maybe…”

They stayed quiet for a few minutes, Annabeth making a few half-hearted strokes that defined the owls better against the background and Percy looking out at the water that swayed calmly with the wind and that glistened under the orange glow of the dusk. Percy had missed them, these moments of relaxed quiet between them, where there was nothing threatening their future in the horizon, nothing worrying to argue about. No battle strategy, no repressed worries. 

Then Annabeth closed her notebook and stretched her arms above her head with a soft grunt. 

“Are you nervous about the flight?” asked Annabeth with a badly hidden smirk. Percy gave a fake shudder. 

“I hope Zeus doesn’t blast me out of the sky,” he said. Annabeth snorted and smacked his arm lightly with her notebook.

“I think the gods have too much going on to pay attention to us right now,” she said. Her smile fell slightly as she looked at the sea. “Maybe that’s why this is such a good moment for us to just… travel. Be stupid tourists for a change.”

“We can buy some of those “I love London” shirts, together with caps and cameras and-” listed off Percy, more and more on the brink of laughter as he imagined the both of them dressed like that. 

“We can comment on every single thing and try to talk with an English accent to see if it works,” continued Annabeth with a grin. Percy blinked and then looked at Annabeth with a serious expression. She arched an eyebrow.

“We can’t leave London without one cup of tea decorated with the Big Ben,” he said. 

They stared at each other without breaking down in laughter for the amazing total of ten seconds, before Percy cracked and Annabeth followed him a second later.

Yeah, maybe the trip was a good idea, after all.

…

Percy almost expected his father to appear at some point, in the middle of the airport, to tell him to forget about his holidays, leave the airport and never return if he didn’t want his dear uncle Zeus to blast him out of the sky with the very same lightning bolt he retrieved for him years before. 

That didn’t happen, of course, but he still spent the hour before they had to board the plane looking around with a frown on his half-asleep face. Paul didn’t help much; he thought it was hilarious, until Annabeth explained how resentful Zeus could be and he ended up sending an alarmed look at Sally. In any case, the most memorable thing they did in that hour was drink Starbucks coffee and wonder why they chose the flight at six in the morning while staring vacantly at the table.

The flight itself wasn’t that bad, once Percy was sure that Zeus wouldn’t kill them. It reminded him of how he flew with Blackjack, only without the wind whistling in his ears and… Actually, it was pretty boring. It was no wonder he ended up taking a nap on Annabeth’s shoulder while they watched a movie. 

The London airport wasn’t that different from New York’s, which was a relief, but also a curse, because it also meant that, if they wanted to get their bags, they’d need to _fight_ for it. Sally and Paul stayed back as Annabeth and him fished their bags and managed to get out of there after Percy had an intense stare-off with a middle-aged woman who was eyeing a California badge he had dangling from his suitcase like it had insulted her family. 

London’s sky was grey when they finally got out of the airport and found a taxi. Percy’s half-asleep brain needed a few minutes to register the fact that they were driving on the other side of the road and he groaned. Crossing streets would be a bigger migraine than usual, wasn’t it? 

Their hotel wasn’t at the heart of London and for that Percy was grateful. He knew how noisy big cities could be, if London was anything like New York. The first thing Annabeth and him did was try their beds with a groan. Sally snickered from the door. Sally and Paul started commenting on the room with soft voices and quiet chuckles as Percy thanked Zeus in his mind for, you know, not trying to kill him for once. 

“We should rest for a bit,” said Sally. “We have dinner with my sister tonight.”

“How was she called, again?” asked Percy. His mother had told him, but Percy had been too in shock with the news to properly interiorize the name and-

“Petunia,” answered Sally. Ah, that was the other reason. 

“I had a cousin too, didn’t I?” he asked. The idea nagged at his mind. Was it one, or was it…?

“Two, actually,” continued Sally, amusement clear in her voice. “Dudley and Harry.” 

Then she paused. Percy frowned at her when he saw the pained glint in her eyes. Something was wrong. 

“Are you okay?” he asked as softly as he could and he made a move to stand, but his mother waved her hand in the air and brushed the hair away from her face. With that, she had everyone’s attention on her. 

“Yes, yes, it’s just…” She took a deep breath. “Harry is not actually Petunia and Vernon’s son.” Percy almost asked if he was a demigod like himself, before forcing himself to stay quiet and let his mother continue. “He is my other sister’s, Lily’s. She… she died when Harry was a baby. I- I was too far away, and I already had you, Percy, and we didn’t have enough money to- Anyway, he went to live with Petunia and her family.”

“I’m guessing they’re not… exactly pleasant,” said Annabeth with a grimace on her face. Sally’s smile was brittle as Paul took her hand with a worried glance at her. 

“Not really, Petunia… ah, Petunia doesn’t really like families that aren’t… normal,” explained Sally, reluctantly. 

“So, she shunned you,” mumbled Paul, shaking his head. Percy felt a spark of anger in his chest. How dare she-?

Annabeth nudged his arm and he turned his tense gaze to her. Her grey eyes were calm on the surface, but Percy knew her better than anyone and could see the hidden layer of fury deep in them. She shook her head slightly. Percy tried to calm himself with a deep breath. 

She was right, of course. This wasn’t the time to throw hands with the part of the family that he hadn’t even met yet. He did that enough with his father’s side, anyway. 

“Basically, yeah,” nodded Sally, and her smile seemed more than a little annoyed. “Didn’t even tell me much about how Harry was doing or anything. And yet- All I had to do now was tell her that my husband was coming with me, also my son and my son’s girlfriend and-” she gestured with her hands in the air and Percy found himself smiling at his mother’s humorous antics. Sally returned it and then shrugged. “So, who wants to think of some kind of plan for tonight?”

Percy looked over at Annabeth and exchanged an amused grin. 

Oh, didn’t they know everything about fake stories to tell. 

…

“So remember our story, okay?” was saying Sally, for what was, like, the twentieth time since they had climbed into the taxi that would bring them to the Dursleys. And really, what kind of surname was that? Also, his cousin was called Dudley Dursley. Talk about a mouthful. 

“Yes, we know the story, mum,” groaned Percy from the backseat. Annabeth rolled her eyes next to him and shook her head. Sally sent them a rueful smile from his other side. 

“Everything will be fine, Sally,” said Paul from the front seat, smiling softly. “You’ll see.”

“Yeah, we’ve handled worse,” nodded Percy in what he hoped would be a confident way. “A few bigoted idiots are nothing.”

He knew how nervous his mother was about seeing his older sister in what was more than a decade, and also her orphaned nephew. Paul and him had been trying to get her mind off things for basically all day, with help from Annabeth when she wasn’t searching for places to eat and planning what they needed to see while they were there. 

It didn’t take too long, but it was enough for Percy to start fidgeting with Riptide in his pocket. He looked from the window at the small houses lined up on both sides of the street, Privet Drive, at their little neat gardens and their cars. It looked like the kind of neighbourhood that always appeared in movies, down to the perfect lawns and tidy street. 

And finally, the taxi driver left them in front of one of the many houses. Number 4, Privet Drive. 

Sally took a deep breath.

“Okay, here we go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still finding my footing and figuring out what the hell will go down during the year, so... update schedule? I don't know her. I'll probably post the next chap soon enough, though, if only because Percy and Harry meet and that's fun. 
> 
> You can check if I'm dead or alive here:  
> Twitter: @irisinally  
> Tumblr: irisinally


	2. A dinner with two pigs, a horse and the knowledge that my family doesn’t suck

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, the meeting!   
> I come from a pretty small fandom, so I'm a bit in shock at how quickly people gave kudos and commented... Thank you everyone!! Have a long-ish chapter to celebrate!

Aunt Petunia was in a weird mood and that was always bad.

It all started a few days before, when they got a call from an unknown number. Harry had been in charge of cleaning the dishes, because his dear aunt had seen his wand on his bed when she barged in to tell him something that he didn’t even get to find out before she flipped out and started screaming gibberish while she pointed at the “piece of wood from hell”, as she called it. In any case, Harry was close to her as she picked up the phone with a fake cheery voice that Harry was sure didn’t fool anyone. 

Harry had stared as her aunt’s expression changed from polite, to annoyed, to considering and, finally, after a suspicious glance at Harry that he couldn’t decipher, it changed to accepting, before she nodded and lowered her voice to talk in a more private manner that Harry hadn’t seen much from her. Like, ever. 

Now, Harry had a lot of experience with suspicious behaviour. He’d been dealing with suspicious individuals for years now and he’d managed to discover their secrets in less than a year. Mostly. They still didn’t know why Snape seemed afraid of shampoo or why Trelawney was so weird or even why Hermione was always so obsessed with books or- The thing was, Harry knew what a suspicious person looked and acted like, so, to see his own aunt like that, it sent alarms through his head. It reminded him of last year’s  _ pleasant guest. _

But this year was different. This year, even if they had guests, Harry could still escape the hell that was his family’s house. The Quidditch World Cup was at the end of August and Harry would be able to escape with his friends and Ron’s family, which was a hundred times better than his own, thank you very much. 

He couldn’t help but feel curious, though. He knew how bigoted and generally  _ close-minded _ , to put it politely, his family was. They didn’t approve of anything that wasn’t  _ normal _ . So, if Harry had to guess from his aunt’s apparent disgust and mistrust, these  _ guests _ would be nothing like last year’s. 

That was comforting, but also confusing, because  _ why _ were they visiting in the first place, then?

And then came the bombshell of “hey, yeah, you have another aunt that we never talked about because she lived in America and we didn’t really get along.”

What was his life?

Aunt Petunia started behaving just like she had last year, screeching (at Harry) when something wasn’t perfectly cleaned, yelling (at Harry) when a cushion was crooked and glaring (at Harry, mostly) when the house wasn’t in the perfect condition for their, uh,  _ guests. _

Honestly, Harry didn’t know what to think of his new aunt. Or, maybe not new, but she was new to him, because he hadn’t known about her before. He almost expected her to be just like his other aunt, aunt Marge, and he really didn’t want to deal with that anytime soon. But, then he remembered Petunia’s disgruntled expression. Maybe she was good. Uncle Vernon wasn’t looking forward to the surprising family reunion either, so maybe… maybe aunt Sally would be more like his mom. Or what he knew about his mom, which actually wasn’t that much. 

Aunt Sally would come with her husband, Paul, her son, Percy, and her son’s girlfriend, Annabeth. Harry only hoped that they weren’t complete assholes and that the young couple wasn’t one of those couples that couldn’t stop making out even on the dinner table, he'd seen enough of those at Hogwarts. 

The week before their arrival was stressful. Harry even tried to get Dudley to help him clean. Keyword being  _ tried _ , because Dudley was full-on teenager mode and that meant that he was even more of a pain in the arse than usual. Harry gave up after Dudley threatened to chuck his controller at his head; not because he was afraid of injury, but because then he’d have to deal with Dudley’s accusations that he had broken his stupid controller. Harry didn’t complain (aloud) and took advantage of this to get his trunk ready for when the Weasley’s came to get him a few days later. He wouldn’t get to spend much time with his “new” family members, but if things went south, maybe it was for the best. And if not- well, he’d cross that bridge when he got there.

It was finally time for the family dinner and Harry decided to sit on the stairs to be as far away as possible from Petunia and Dudley’s argument about a shirt he needed to put on for dinner. He sighed and drummed his fingers on his leg, nervous. Either this dinner would be the best or the worst he’d ever had, and after days of overthinking things, he wasn’t sure anymore which of them it would be. 

The door ringed just after Petunia ended her argument with Dudley. Harry hesitated before he reached the door and grimaced. He was sure that his aunt wouldn’t want him to open the door. 

Indeed, Petunia shoved him out of the way with a fierce glare that turned into fake cheer as she turned to the door. Harry shrugged and walked into the living room, ignoring his uncle’s glare and sitting on one of the sofas, trying to make himself smaller, which wasn’t that difficult when he was in the same room as his cousin and uncle. 

“Sally! It’s been so long since we last saw each other!” greeted Petunia and Harry grimaced deeply at the false sweetness oozing from her mouth. It was almost painful.

“It really has, Petunia,” answered a new voice, soft and polite and with a natural calm that made Harry perk up with curiosity and hope. There was  _ no way  _ that aunt Sally was anything like aunt Marge. 

“Come in, come in, we can make the introductions when we’re all together!” chirped Petunia. 

Harry took a deep breath and steeled himself. 

_ Here goes nothing. _

The first person to enter was, of course, aunt Petunia, but the next was a woman that Harry had never seen before. Then he paused and had to stop himself from gawking, because he  _ had  _ seen his mother's image years before in the Mirror of Erised and the woman in front of him was  _ clearly _ her sister. 

Sally was much younger compared to Petunia and definitely didn't look like a horse. Her hair was soft and curly, a nice shade of brown slightly streaked with grey, and even from across the room, Harry was pretty sure that her eyes were blue. Her gaze, calm and sharp at the same time, held tension as she glanced around the living room. Until she met Harry's eyes, that is, when her shoulders seemed to drop and she managed to send him a little nervous smile. Harry was fond of her immediately. She reminded him of a slightly different Molly Weasley, more calm and withdrawn, not to mention young. He managed to give her a little grin in response. 

"I'll introduce us, Sally dear," said Petunia. Sally turned to her again, politely interested. Petunia started walking around the room as she pointed at each family member. "This is my husband Vernon, I'm sure you still remember him from our wedding." Harry saw Sally give a tense nod. Vernon returned it with a false smile on his face. "This is my dear perfect son, Dudley." Harry wanted to puke. Then, after a slight pause, almost offhandedly, she pointed at Harry, "oh, and that's Harry."

It could have been worse, in Harry's opinion. Sally's lips were thin, but she managed to smile politely at them. 

"It's a pleasure to meet you, boys, and it's good to see you well, Vernon," she said. 

"Likewise, Sally," almost grunted Vernon. His smile was sharp. 

"Now then, this is Paul, my husband," started Sally, pointing at the man by her side. It reminded Harry of an older Professor Lupin, with the same salt and pepper hair and kind brown eyes. "This is my son, Percy," she continued and Harry paused. He couldn’t see the other boy too well, as he was slightly hidden behind his father, but he could make out how tall he was and how messy his hair was, just like his own. "And this, is Percy's girlfriend, Annabeth Chase."

Again, the girl was slightly hidden, but Harry still saw the curly blond hair and the tanned skin. He cursed in his mind; he should have chosen the other sofa. Then he looked over and saw that the other sofa wasn't even available in the first place, seeing as Dudley took over almost all of it. 

"Sit down, sit down, the dinner will be ready in a minute!" said Petunia and she motioned to the sofas. 

Harry almost snorted at the hesitating glance his aunt Sally sent to Dudley's sofa, before she moved gracefully to sit on Harry's sofa, which… surprised him quite a lot, actually. Paul and her sat down at his side, which left Percy and Annabeth to sit on the other sofa by his left. 

Sally's perfume was a welcomed change from Petunia’s overbearing perfumes and he let himself relax next to her. He chanced a glance at her and he was surprised again when she met his gaze with a good-natured smile and caring eyes. Oh, he shouldn't be getting carried away with this, but she reminded him of how Ms Weasley treated him even before he became Ron's friend. 

Then he turned his head to the side, hoping to finally catch his supposed cousin and his girlfriend. He cheered in his mind when he could. 

He didn't know what kind of image his mind originally had for his cousin, but he was quite sure that he had imagined him as some kind of Dudley number two unconsciously. That was completely shattered when he finally saw his cousin clearly. 

Percy didn't look much like his mother at first glance and definitely not like his father Paul. His hair was black, like Harry's own, as well as messy, but while Harry's looked like it had never met a comb, Percy's looked more windblown, as if he had spent all day at the beach. His skin was also slightly tanned, which continued the beach relation. They were too far apart, but Harry was quite sure that Percy's eyes were some kind of sea-green that reminded him of the lake at Hogwarts. His face was all sharp angles and high cheekbones. And, most importantly, his expression was almost brooding, but his eyes were sharp like the Weasley twins'. 

Annabeth Chase, on the other hand, had curly blond hair that passed her shoulders and tan skin. Harry noted that both of them looked like they spent their days under the sun. Her face was softer, but her eyes, on the other side, were sharp and probably grey, for what Harry could see. At one point, she seemed to feel him staring, because she turned to him and pinned him in place with a focused gaze. It was like Hermione's, knowing and calculating, but so much more striking and fierce. 

So, this part of the family that he didn't even know existed a few days before was… interesting, to say the least. 

"-first time visiting London, isn't it?" Vernon was talking, with that tone of voice he always reserved to guests. "Do you know where to go sightseeing?" 

"Oh, yes, we've spent all afternoon planning," said Sally, seeing as she was apparently the appointed voice of the group. Then she grinned and looked at Annabeth with glinting eyes. "Annabeth here has a few monuments she wants to see, right?" 

"Oh, yes," nodded Annabeth, catching on with Sally's plan. "I need inspiration for a personal project, so I thought that these monuments could help me."

"Personal project?" frowned Vernon, confused. Percy huffed out a soft laugh. 

"Annabeth here wants to be an architect," he explained. Harry saw his uncle Vernon's eyes glint. 

And with that, Vernon started rambling on and on about how architecture was a commendable profession, very professional, it gave a lot of money if one was good at their job. Harry kind of tuned it out for a while, not really interested in the mechanics of the muggle world. Don't get him wrong, he liked the muggle world well enough, but- his heart was on the wizarding world nowadays. 

He didn't seem to be the only one not listening to Vernon, if he had to guess from Percy's roaming eyes and the hidden grimace at the most obnoxious pieces of china that Petunia had on display around the living room like some kind of grandma. He still had trouble with Percy's name; everytime he thought of it, the first image that came to mind was that of Percy Weasley and, if he had to guess from the little lopsided grins this Percy gave to Annabeth from time to time, the two Percys were quite different. 

Harry stayed quiet through the twenty minutes that it took dinner to be ready. Petunia disappeared in the kitchen for a few minutes and then guided them all to the table. Surprisingly, Sally sat next to him again. Even more surprising was that Percy decided to sit on his other side after sending him a conspiratorial grin. 

"So, Percy, you go to high school, right?" asked Petunia with a fake smile. Harry shoveled a few fries in his mouth to hide his grimace. 

"Oh, yeah, I got in thanks to Paul, really," answered Percy, sending a grin at his… father? Why did he call him by name? 

"What about you two?" asked Sally, looking at Dudley and him with an expectant smile. Harry almost choked on his surprise. His aunt was interested in  _ him _ ? 

"Oh, Dudders is starting high school this year," gushed Petunia, her smile an abnormal monstrosity on her horse face. "He'll continue to have perfect scores in all his subjects, right, honey?" 

Dudley managed a half-smile that looked more pained than genuine and Harry didn't have to look to see how Petunia was probably taking his hand in hers and squeezing to keep him from telling the truth. And the truth, of course, was that dear Dudders had only been accepted into that high school after uncle Vernon had acceded to pay more for the tutors that he'd need, seeing as his scores weren't… that good. At all. Harry was quite sure that Neville had better scores in  _ Potions _ than Dudley in all his subjects. 

Then he noticed how Sally was still looking at him, expectant and inviting. He gulped. 

"And you, Harry?" asked Sally, as kind as always. 

Harry was about to say something about a boarding school outside the city, when aunt Petunia spoke before he could even open his mouth. 

"Harry here goes to St Brutus's Secure Centre for Incurable Criminal Boys," she said with a sneer. 

Harry clenched his fist around his fork and tried to calm himself, least he stabbed his aunt with cutlery. If he did that, would he go live with aunt Sally? Probably not, they would have the excuse they needed to actually send him to that school. 

"Sounds like a military school," commented Annabeth and she met Percy’s eyes, before the both of them tried to hide the grins on their faces. 

Okay…? That wasn't the reaction Harry was expecting. 

"Don't worry, man, I went to one of those," said Percy, completely unfazed by the affronted and alarmed expressions Petunia and Vernon sent their way. Merlin's beard, he even  _ winked  _ at Harry. "Didn't last more than a few months before they expelled me."

"Expe-!" started to screech Petunia, but she was interrupted by Sally's amused laugh. 

"I don't even remember why you were expelled," she said between giggles. Harry stared. He could only- stare. 

"Hey, it's not my fault trouble always finds me," retorted Percy, but he was still grinning. Annabeth snorted by his side as she ate. 

"Typical Seaweed Brain," she mumbled, voice full of soft fondness. Percy grinned at her. 

Okay, it was official, Harry was sold on this side of the family. Why couldn't they have met sooner? 

“A-anyway,” stuttered Petunia, “Sally, dear, you told me you were pregnant?”

“Oh, yes,” nodded Sally and her smile turned soft and motherly. Harry’s chest tightened. She looked  _ so much _ like his mother, it hurt. “Only for a few months, though.”

“We still don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl,” continued Paul with the same soft smile. Harry wasn’t a genius, but he could see clear as day that they were completely in love. 

“Well, that’s always good to hear. Congratulations, you two,” smiled Vernon and for a moment Harry wondered if it was genuine or just another polite thing he had forced out. Then he paused and Harry tensed. “I’ve been wondering but- we didn’t hear from you in more than a decade. Why did you call us so suddenly?”

As rude as that question was, Harry had wondered the same thing. 

Sally’s smile dimmed and her hand holding the fork trembled slightly. Harry could see because he was close to her, but he was quite sure that the others didn’t see it. Paul did too, of course, and he put a careful hand on her arm. The next time that Sally raised her head, her smile was brittle. 

“These past few months… they have been pretty hard for everyone,” she said, voice soft. Harry was sure that it hadn’t been his imagination; Sally had sent a worried glance at Percy and Annabeth. “I thought we could use a break. Have the kids meet each other.”

Harry thought that they were a bit too old to be called “kids”, but he didn’t say anything, just in case. He noticed how Percy and Annabeth had lowered their heads slightly, smiles gone. Harry frowned. Something serious had happened to them. He would keep his mouth shut for once, though. Whatever it was, he was quite sure that it wasn’t his business. It wasn’t as if they were Death Eaters or any other threat to him or his school, anyway. 

The conversation moved to safer topics, like the differences between London and New York, how bad the traffic was in both, the perks of being an English teacher and the food. Percy and Annabeth seemed to become less tense as time went on and, as strange as it sounded, Harry was glad. He was tempted to talk more with them, but didn’t dare try it when he saw the glare aunt Petunia sent his way every time he leaned a bit towards Percy to make a snide comment about something or other. That didn’t mean he wouldn’t try later. For what he’d seen, Percy’s sarcasm and dry humour rivaled his own and both him and Annabeth ended up bantering between them for a good portion of dinner. 

On the other side of the table, Harry noticed the tense air between the sisters. Sally always tried to bring up a topic, only for Petunia to interrupt her immediately, talking over her and sending the younger woman a warning glare that soon turned into a wide smile seconds after. Sally’s shoulders became more and more tense as dinner went on, her lips thin, until Paul seemed to catch on and ended up frowning between the two sisters with worry clear in his eyes. 

When they were done with dinner, Sally tried again. This time, it worked.

“Petunia, we need to talk, can we go outside for a moment?” said Sally, quickly and with a look in her eyes that always meant business. Petunia opened her mouth, but Sally continued. “The kids can stay here and get to know each other without us boring adults, right?”

She turned to them, sending a pointed glance at her son Percy, who didn’t waste time and nodded.

“Yeah, go do your thing, we won’t blow up the house,” he said, grinning slightly. Annabeth rolled her eyes by his side, but nodded at Sally, nonetheless. 

Petunia looked slightly distressed and alarmed, as if she thought that Percy’s words would become true, but ultimately nodded and dragged Vernon with her outside to the garden, closing the glass door after them and disappearing in the darkness until all they could hear from the conversation was a mumble of voices. 

Harry sighed slightly and looked at his cousins. Dudley was looking around boredly and Harry was pretty sure he was going to get up at any moment. Percy and Annabeth, on the other hand, seemed to be having a silent conversation via glances and expressions. Harry closed his eyes and rubbed his face. 

“This is boring,” complained Dudley in his stupidly gravelly voice. Harry swore he ate rocks. His brain definitely had some. “I’m going up for my consolle.”

“Suit yourself,” grumbled Harry, glaring at Dudley’s back as he walked slowly towards the stairs. 

Silence. Then-

“Does he really fit through there?” asked Percy, voice low and slightly amazed. Harry blinked and turned to him with an arched eyebrow, but when he saw where he was looking, the stairs, he couldn’t hide his snort. 

“Yeah, I was surprised too,” said Harry, also in a whisper. Percy smirked. “He’s actually on a diet, you see.”

“And he ate all that?” asked Percy, looking pointedly at Dudley’s plate. Harry’s grin widened. 

“That was tame. For him,” he explained. Percy snorted. 

After a few seconds of silence, Percy finally stood up from the table with a slight grunt and cracked his knuckles. For a moment, Harry was reminded of the bullies from his muggle schools, but Percy just walked away slowly, looking around with slightly bored eyes and his hands in his jean pockets. Annabeth was doing something similar, only sitting down, and instead of looking at the millions of object strewn around the room, she was looking curiously at the ceiling and the fireplace. 

“I thought I’d seen everything,” commented Percy from the living room. Harry looked over and saw him looking at the dozens of china hanging on the walls and on display. “But this is horrendous.”

“You should see their bedroom,” commented Harry with a slight grin. Percy turned and returned it.

“No, thank you, I think I’ve seen enough,” he said. 

“Maybe we should re-decorate the apartment like this,” continued Annabeth, completely serious. Percy sent her an horrified look. Annabeth just shrugged, the corner of her mouth twitching up. “What? I think it would be a nice ‘personal touch’.”

“Touch? Or explosion?” asked Percy, arching a dark eyebrow. He looked to his side, peeked at the ceramic swan that stared right at him, gave a shudder and returned to the table. “It’d probably give every one who entered a fit.”

“Win-win situation,” shrugged Annabeth. She reached out and took another piece of the leftover cake. 

“That includes us,” said Percy, sitting down on his seat again. He frowned at the piece of cake on his girlfriend’s plate. “Do you honestly have room for more?”

“Hey, it’s a good cake,” answered Annabeth simply.

Harry found himself staring. Those two reminded him of what Ron and Hermione’s relationship could be if, you know, they could stop arguing about every little thing in the world. 

They fell silent again, with the only sound being the clink of Annabeth’s fork on the plate and whatever Dudley was doing in his room. Harry didn’t feel awkward, per se, but now that he could actually  _ talk _ with his other cousin without his aunt Petunia breathing down his neck, Harry found himself with nothing to say. He could ask again about life in New York, but they had spent a good portion of dinner talking about exactly that. It was at that moment that he realized just how much the wizarding world had taken over his life; he couldn’t even talk with his normal relatives about anything they could have in common. What was your favourite sport? Oh, yeah, one where you fly on brooms. Favourite school subject? Defense Against the Dark Arts, where we learn about monsters and self-defense with magic. 

“Stupid jet-lag,” grumbled Percy next to him, just before he covered his mouth to hide a wide yawn. He reached out to wipe away the tears that escaped his eyes. 

“Did you have to wake up too early?” asked Harry, tilting his head to the side. Percy gave him a look of suffering.

“We had to wake up at 4 in the morning,” he said. Harry blinked. Wow, that was… wow. “Yeah. We took a nap back at the hotel but, honestly? It didn’t do much.” Percy glanced outside. “Hope they sort it out quickly so we can go back and sleep.”

“What are they even talking about?” asked Harry, genuinely curious. 

“Probably you,” answered Annabeth from Percy’s other side. She had finished the cake and was wiping her lips from any stray chocolate stains. Harry’s eyes widened. 

“Me?” he repeated. He frowned, completely confused. “Why?”

Sally wasn’t a witch too, right? He would know, right? Well, probably not, if only because he hadn’t even known she existed until a few days before, but- Even if she wasn’t a witch, who was to say that she didn’t know about him and his  _ fame- _ ?

“Mom was pretty angry with Petunia for not telling her about how you were doing or anything,” explained Percy. He was now sprawled on his chair, fiddling with his napkin and fork. Harry felt warm in his chest. Was she really upset beca- for him? For  _ him _ ? “She’s probably giving our dear aunt a piece of her mind, right now.”

“Sally is terrifying when she’s angry,” nodded Annabeth. 

Harry still couldn’t find the words. He just couldn’t. The thought that there was still a family member that didn’t hate him on sight, that  _ cared _ for him, that was willing to yell at his caretakers for his sake, it was- it was a bit overwhelming. 

“Did dear Dudders get stuck somewhere up there?” asked Percy after a while. “He isn’t coming down.”

“He’ll probably come down when the adults come back with some half-baked excuse like, ‘I was going to show them my games’, or something like that,” answered Harry, after he shook his head to clear his mind. 

As if he had invoked them, the adults re-entered the room. Sally looked quite satisfied, even if her eyes were suspiciously red, and she held her head high as she walked back to the table. Paul followed her with a slight smile on his face, eyes focused on his wife with something that looked a great deal like pride. Petunia and Vernon, on the other hand, looked like they had been reprimanded like little children for the first time in their life. They hung back as Sally walked towards her son, running a hand through Harry’s messy hair on the way, which made him jump and look at her with wide eyes. Sally smiled at him, before turning to the older two.

“Percy, Annabeth, we’re going back to the hotel,” she announced. She couldn’t - or maybe didn’t want to - hide the satisfaction in her voice. 

“Finally,” grunted Percy, as he stood up again. Paul chuckled. 

Annabeth grinned, amused, and shook her head with fondness in her eyes, as she intertwined her fingers through Percy’s. Percy sent her a lopsided grin and nudged her. 

The entire family went to the door to see them off, after a tense wait for the taxi. Dudley  _ did _ appear seconds after their announcement, with the very same excuse that Harry had said that he would. Harry, Percy and Annabeth shared a knowing glance between them, before looking away from each other, trying to hide their snickers and snorts. Sally sent them a rather interested glance, but other than that, they were quite successful. 

“Harry,” called Sally before they walked out of the house. Harry turned to her, slightly nervous, but at the same time, hopeful. Sally’s smile was as kind as it had been for the majority of the night. “I know that you’re going on a trip with some of your friends in a few days, but do you want to come with us while we visit London?”

Harry could almost feel Petunia’s breath down his neck, Dudley’s glare, the pressure Vernon’s presence always carried, but, as he looked into Sally’s kind eyes, as he looked at her smile that was so similar to the one the Mirror of Erised had shown him of his mother, he couldn’t care less about his stupid relatives that had made his life hell every time he went back there. 

So, of course he nodded. 

Sally’s smile widened. Paul called to her from the taxi and Sally hurried to tell him when they would meet the next day, before bolting down the path and into the taxi, next to her son and his girlfriend. She gave a last wave out the window, before they took off. 

Harry stared after them until he couldn’t see the taxi anymore and Vernon barked at him to close the damn door. 

Harry closed the door with a wide grin. 

It had been an amazing dinner.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can you tell that I love Sally? Because I love her.


	3. We're caught water-handed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sightseeing! This is based slightly on my own visit but with like... less glares from British people?

The fact that he didn’t dream anything weird that night was probably what gave him hope that, maybe, just maybe, the day would be relaxing for once. He didn’t even remember his nightmare, even if he was quite sure that it had been about Tartarus. 

The four of them shared a room. It was quite cramped, but they weren't exactly rich and Sally had joked that they didn't trust Percy and Annabeth to not do something stupid. Percy resented that. They were perfectly mature. 

Sharing a room between four people also meant that the single bathroom was like a war zone. Percy jokingly offered to have a shower together with Annabeth, before she threw his clothes at his face and ran into the bathroom, locking the door with a triumphant cackle. Gods, he loved her so much. 

They had a quick breakfast while Annabeth told them what they could visit that day. She had managed to get her hands on some pamphlets, but after a few minutes of her and Percy trying to figure them out - seriously, why did they write it in  _ cursive _ ? - Paul took pity on them and summarized it before they decided to rip the stupid pamphlets apart. 

Before taking the taxi to their relatives' house, Annabeth disappeared for a few minutes and returned with a camera around her neck. With a bag slung on her shoulders, camera around her neck and sneakers, she looked the part of a tourist. Percy figured he wasn't one to talk, as he also had comfortable clothes and was wearing a cap to block out the sun. 

Last night had been… interesting. He had already figured that his dear aunt Petunia wouldn't be the best person in the world, especially because of how she had treated his mom, but last night had been enlightening. Petunia and her husband, who looked like a whale the same way Petunia’s face kind of looked like horse's, were the epitome of fake politeness for appearances’ sake. And the  _ house _ , gods, he'd never seen that many ceramic objects and frills and- it was horrible. Absolutely, completely, horrible. He had spent a good chunk of the drive back to the hotel complaining about it with Annabeth. 

Not only that. His cousin Dudley looked like a miniature version of his father, which wasn't really a compliment. That wasn't the worst, though. Percy'd had to deal with bullies his entire life; he was poor when he was younger, had dyslexia and ADHD and he didn't usually take any shit from anyone, which meant conflict. He knew how to figure out who could be a bully, and his cousin Dudley was the definition of one. He had only needed a glance at his other cousin's - Harry's - reaction to know what was going on at that house. 

And Harry. Honestly, Percy had a good feeling about Harry. He was scrawny, a few years younger than himself, with messy black hair that rivaled his own and green emerald eyes that he didn't hesitate to roll when his caretakers said something stupid. And he hadn't wasted time to match his dry remarks with his own. So, yeah, Percy was quite sure that they were going to get along. That was why he was curious about meeting him again without their other relatives and spend a day just knowing each other. But not too much, of course. 

The day before they had spent a good portion of the afternoon figuring out how to avoid the topic of, well, their  _ special condition _ . Sally was clear when she said that Petunia and her family didn't accept anything that wasn't the norm. Telling them about the demigod business wasn't an option. It did make Percy wonder, though. If they didn't accept weirdness, then did that mean that Harry wasn't the norm? Why did they treat him that bad? His mom had told them just after getting in the taxi how the Dursleys treated him. She didn't go into details, probably because she didn't know the whole story herself, only what she had been able to rip from the other couple, but Percy knew that fire in her eyes, that anger. It reminded him of his own whenever he had to deal with any unfair business, which usually was when dealing with gods and what not. 

Privet Drive didn't look that different in the daylight and Percy watched as his mom climbed off the taxi and walked to the house with determined steps and clenched fists. He almost expected her to punch the first person that opened the door who wasn't Harry. 

The door opened, there was a short conversation between probably the two sisters and soon, Sally was returning to the taxi with Harry in tow. 

Percy was glad that they had asked for a bigger taxi this time, because otherwise there was no way that 5 people plus the driver could fit inside. 

"I searched around home for these," was saying Sally, rummaging around her purse. Harry, sitting next to her, looked slightly awkward but hopeful, if Percy had to guess from his glances at Sally. "I didn't have many, sorry about that. Petunia got her hands on most of them and I have no idea what she's done with them."

She finally got out a envelope and she gave it to Harry with a smile. Harry blinked, surprised and confused and Percy grinned slightly as he leaned forward, crossing his arms on the seat in front of him. 

"They're photos," he explained simply. He pointed at the envelope when Harry's wide eyes turned to him. "From when our moms lived together. Man, they were pretty hard to find, they were under a ton of other photos."

"It wasn't that a bad," said Annabeth from his side, shooting an amused grin at him. "You were a cute baby."

Percy sputtered and Annabeth let out a laugh. 

Harry spent the rest of the ride looking carefully through some of the photos. Sally commented on some of them, pointing out things with a smile and nostalgic eyes. She explained how the three sisters had grown apart when their parents died and Sally had to leave Great Britain to live with some distant relatives that lived in America. Petunia stayed behind, seeing as she was the oldest and was already of age, and Lily stayed at her boarding school most of the time. 

Percy didn’t pay much attention to them. He respected their privacy, especially when Sally reached out and hugged Harry, whispering something about his mother’s eyes. Instead, Annabeth and him pressed against one window and watched as London passed outside their window, commenting on the people walking around and trying to figure out where they were in the map Annabeth had stuffed into their shared bag. Somehow, it reminded him of their first quest together, when they had to get to the Underworld entrance in Los Angeles. It seemed like a lifetime ago. 

When they finally got to the giant building that was the British Museum, they pilled out of the taxi as Paul paid the driver. 

“So, what did you want to see here?” asked Percy, genuinely curious, nudging Annabeth’s shoulder as soon as they entered. She had insisted on coming, saying that it was one of the world’s most important museums. More like rambled, really. In any case, Percy now knew that there were expositions of a lot of ancient civilizations in there. 

He wondered if there was anything about Greece. Then he wondered if he really wanted to visit it and probably remember what happened at Greece when he was there just a few weeks before. 

“I was thinking of taking a look at as many rooms as we can, really,” said Annabeth after a thoughtful humm. Her eyes stumbled over the names on the map until they focused on one. Percy followed her gaze.  _ Ancient Greece _ . He reached out and intertwined his fingers with hers and gave her hand a squeeze. She squeezed back. 

“Have you been here before, Harry?” was asking Sally, as she stuffed her wallet on her purse. Paul was reading a guidebook one worker had shoved at him as soon as they got through the gate. 

“Once, with my school,” shrugged Harry. His eyes looked around, not really interested. Percy couldn’t blame him. He wasn’t a fan of museums himself. He  _ was _ a fan of seeing Annabeth rambling about her interests, though. 

They went through some rooms, commenting on some of the objects on display. Annabeth read as many explanations and history as she could, but she was still slow at it. Percy usually ended up walking around the room, eyeing the objects. He compared mentally the swords to his own with a proud small grin on his face and crossed a few amused glances with his parents, who seemed to have the same idea as him. 

Harry, for his part, really did seem a bit bored. Percy moved to his side while Annabeth poured all her attention into some kind of mummy at the Egypt gallery with laser focus. It almost looked as if she was working on some kind of battle plan, with how focused she was at that moment. Harry looked up at him from where he had been looking at some metal parts that had once been a spear, with his hands in his pockets. Percy wasn’t too sure, but he could swear that Harry’s clothes always seemed too big on him. It reminded him of when he had put on one of Tyson’s shirts one morning when he was half-asleep. 

“Not a fan of museums?” he asked with a slight smirk. Harry looked up at him and then shrugged, looking back down. 

“Not really, it’s not my thing,” he said. “It reminds me too much of school, we’re supposed to be on vacation.”

Percy couldn’t help but laugh. School… wow, he had a hard year in front of him, didn’t he? He still had to talk with some people about what he could do to not mess up his future, especially now that he had an inkling of an idea brewing in his mind after seeing Camp Jupiter’s habitants. 

“Yeah, I’m not really fond of them myself,” he said and couldn’t help but remember all the trouble he’d had in a good variety of museums during his life. Unsurprisingly, most of them were related to monsters. Percy shrugged. “But Annabeth was dying to come here, so.”

“She reminds me of a friend of mine,” nodded Harry absentmindedly. Percy arched an eyebrow at him, curious. Harry managed a small grin. “She’s a bookworm. She spends all her free time at the library when we’re at school. Makes us look like lazy idiots.”

Percy hummed, considering. Harry was pretty fond of this friend of his. It wasn’t that he thought that problematic kids were unable to make meaningful friendships - seeing as he could count as one himself - it was just that… it didn’t make sense, right?

“What our dear aunt Petunia said about your school…” Percy looked down at Harry with a more serious expression than he had intended and he could see the other tense under his gaze. “You’re not really going there, are you?” Harry blinked at him, surprised and maybe a bit freaked out. Percy shrugged and turned away to look around. “It’s just… I’ve been at one of them before and I’m pretty sure that no one in there would  _ willingly _ go to the library in their free time. Myself included.”

Harry opened his mouth, before closing it and looking away. 

“That’s… right,” admitted Harry, quietly. He didn’t say anything else. 

He didn’t get to ask anymore - he didn’t even know what he would have asked, anyway - because Annabeth finally lifted her head and looked around slightly, as if she had forgotten where she was and how much time she’d been reading, which was probably true. 

They moved through some more rooms, resting from time to time and talking in hushed tones after a particularly grumpy man, clearly a tourist, glared at them when Annabeth joked under her breath and Percy couldn’t keep his laughter down. After a short moment of hesitation and worried glances from both Sally and Paul when they came across the door to the Ancient Greece exposition, they decided to enter. 

Percy tried not to look too closely at the photos of Athens. Now that he knew what the gods and other mythical creatures looked like, he found himself comparing them to the statues with an almost critical eye. At some point, Annabeth took a deep breath and took out her sketchbook and pencil to sketch a few ideas. 

“Is this about her personal project?” asked Harry. Percy, who had been frowning at a nearly destroyed statue of Apollo, jumped and his hand flew to his pocket and around Riptide. He blinked.

“Ah, yeah,” he nodded numbly. “A temple, I think.”

Harry hummed, slightly interested. Percy tried to calm his heart; being startled while surrounded by things that reminded him of a recent war and pain wasn’t exactly pleasant. 

He was alone again soon enough, as Paul dragged Harry away and started telling him some kind of myth that seemed to hook Harry enough to keep him from staring into space. Percy wasn’t sure, but it was possible that Paul had seen his vacant gaze. His mom was moving around as if she wasn’t sure if he needed someone near him to drag him back to the present. He huffed out a dry laugh and walked over to her, just in time to make fun of a statue of Poseidon that didn’t look like his father at all and seemed to greatly amuse his mom. 

They got out of the museum just in time for lunch. Harry clued them on where to go, seeing as he knew a bit about the area. They still spent at least an hour to find a decent restaurant and even longer to finish eating. British gastronomy was… weird, but Percy didn’t complain. Food was food, after all. 

After lunch, they decided to have some ice cream. The nearest store was close to one of the bridges, so Sally pushed the three of them - Percy, Annabeth and Harry - to take a peek at the river while they got their ice creams. 

Percy hadn’t realized how much he had missed seeing a big mass of water. They had spent a few days before going to London just organizing everything, they hadn’t returned to Camp or anything, so… it had actually been a while. Just the sound of the water under him brought peace to his mind and managed to release the tension he hadn’t even realized was on his shoulders. Annabeth herself looked a bit brighter, with her eyes closed and peaceful expression. 

“Did you get any ideas from the museum?” asked Percy after a few seconds of peaceful silence. Annabeth hummed.

“A few,” she answered. “I’ll try to implement them tonight, see if they work.”

Percy saw Paul gesturing for one of them to go help them with the ice creams as his mom laughed with the worker and he made a move to go help, but Harry was faster.

“I got it,” he said with a grin that looked wider than at the start of the day. “Save our seat.”

It  _ was _ a good spot, if Percy said so himself. They were pressed against one of the buildings, in a way that let them avoid the rush of the people next to them on the street. It was a good place to just relax, even with all the noise around them. Percy didn’t mind; after all, he was from New York. Noise was a given. 

“You sure nobody would see us, right?” he asked in a soft voice. Annabeth looked at him with an arched eyebrow, then looked around. 

“Probably not,” she said in the end. She turned back to him, suspicious. “Why?”

No sooner had she said that, Percy controlled the water of the river so it hit her knees. She yelped and turned to him with a glare. He grinned. She huffed and reached for his cap, intent of pulling it over his face, but he struck with a small string of water again. 

“Percy, I  _ swear _ -” she grunted, but her smile was fierce and her eyes were amused and ready for a challenge as she moved forward. 

And then they heard a gasp. 

_ Well, shit. _

Percy turned to the side and met Harry’s wide eyes. 

A million questions and excuses flew by his mind, but at that moment, all he could do was stare with growing horror as Harry moved closer to them with an ice cream in each hand. One of them was blue, which probably was Percy’s, but honestly? He didn’t know if he had the appetite for that anymore. Damn it, wasn't the Mist supposed to-? 

Percy crossed a glance with Annabeth, saw that look he knew so well, a slight frown, pursed lips, that I’m-planning-something look. But before she could open her mouth to probably save their cover, Harry talked.

“Are you both wizards too?” he asked, and his voice was awed, amazed, and  _ what the actual Hades was he talking about? _

“Uh, do you mean, like, children of Hec-?” he started asking, completely lost, but Annabeth clenched her hand around his arm. When Percy looked at her, he saw her wide grin and shining eyes, but he also saw the urgency in her gaze when she sent him a fleeting glance before turning back to Harry.

“Yes, we are, are you… a wizard too?” she asked.

Percy understood immediately.

_ Oh, we’re winging it.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Mist did work, only... not in the way they thought.


	4. I tell conspiracy theories to my cousin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooo uni finally started. If I suddenly disappear for a while, don't worry, I'm just drowning under uni stuff.

Okay, so, maybe that other part of the family that he hadn’t even known existed was gaining more and more points by the second and,  _ maybe _ , he was getting a bit carried away with it all, but could you blame him? 

Turns out that Percy and Annabeth were also  _ wizards, how cool was that? _

Sally and Paul returned a few minutes later, talking and laughing with more ice cream, until they saw the tense air between them. Paul frowned and Harry saw a glint of worry in his eyes as the man looked over to the older teenagers, for some reason that Harry couldn’t figure out. 

“Sally, Paul, turns out that Harry is  _ also _ a wizard,” said Annabeth, hurriedly, grey eyes alert and jumpy. Harry could understand; they were in the middle of a public place, if people heard them they would think they were completely crazy. Not that he minded much - he was already regarded as a special case at school, anyway. 

Sally and Paul looked confused for a moment, but then Percy nodded and their eyes lighted up with recognition. 

They decided to find a secluded place at one of the nearby parks. Sally sighed when she sat down on a bench and Harry was forcefully reminded of the fact that she was, in fact, pregnant. Was it even safe for her to be travelling around? He didn’t know, but if he had to guess from Paul’s agitated expression, the most likely answer was probably “not really”. It wouldn’t stop his aunt, though, for what Harry had seen. 

“So, what is your school like?” asked Annabeth, as soon as they sat down, eyes shining with so much curiosity, she reminded him of Hermione. Harry’s chest ached. He would see his friends in less than two days, he could wait a little longer. 

“It’s amazing!” gushed Harry. He hadn’t realized how much he needed to talk about the place he had started calling home from the first moment he stepped foot in it. “It’s this huge castle. It has a ton of moving portraits and interesting stuff and lots of secret rooms.”

Percy and Annabeth crossed a befuddled glance, completely shocked, and Harry tilted his head to the side. Was their school not like that?

“Our school is much more… small, I guess,” said Annabeth, slowly, as if she had read his mind. “It’s actually kind of a summer camp.”

“Yeah, I don’t think it’s well known, really, now that I think about it,” continued Percy, considering, fidgeting with the bag that was now on his lap. Harry frowned. That was… weird. 

“Yes, it’s not like an  _ actual _ school,” explained Annabeth. 

“How do you learn enough, then? Is it different over there in America or something?” asked Harry. If they needed to learn everything they did in just a few months a year… that was suicide.

“I mean, there’s people that stay there all year-round,” mussed Percy. 

“Wait… Lily was also a witch, wasn’t she?” interrupted Sally, voice breathless and shocked. Harry almost slapped himself; he had basically forgotten that they weren’t alone. 

“Yes, she was,” nodded Harry. “She went to the same school as me, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.”

“That… explains so much,” mumbled Sally, lowering her head. When all of them stared at her, she huffed out an awkward laugh. “I mean, I knew she studied at a boarding school. We kind of lost contact after some time, but I know that much. Petunia didn’t like to talk about it, so I didn’t know… But that makes sense, now that I think about it.”

Sally fell quiet and Paul put a comforting hand on her arm. Harry worried about her for a moment - after all, she was probably the only family member (apart from her own family and, of course, Sirius) that cared about him and he was just _so curious_ about her. 

“What subjects do you have?” asked Annabeth, tilting her head to the side. 

“Well, the usual, I guess,” shrugged Harry. “Transfiguration, Charms, Potions, History… My favourite one is probably DADA, though.”

“Similar to ours, then,” mumbled Annabeth. She crossed a glance with Percy, almost as if she was expecting him to confirm it. Percy didn’t waste time and nodded.

“Yep,” he said, simply. Then he frowned. “Those sound incredibly theoretical, though. Don’t you have something… more physical?”

“Physical?” repeated Harry. Were their classes different than theirs? If their classes were more hands-on, that sounded pretty cool and much better than spending hours in front of books and rolls of parchment until their eyes closed from how bored they were. “I mean, we play Quidditch. I’m the Seeker of my team, actually.”

“Quidditch?” frowned Percy. Harry gaped at him.

“You don’t know what Quidditch is?” escaped his mouth before he could reel it in and think about the implications that had. But really-  _ no Quidditch? _

“Like we said, our school slash camp is pretty small, so we don’t get to do everything and Quidditch is not that popular back in America,” said Annabeth, maybe too quickly, but her cheeks were slightly red. Harry relaxed his shoulders. 

“Oh, I see,” he ended up saying, but his frown didn’t fade. “It’s still weird, though. I mean, I’m going to the Quidditch World Cup the day after tomorrow with my friends, so I expected Quidditch to be quite popular… well, everywhere.”

“I guess it depends,” chuckled Annabeth. 

Percy snorted slightly and took advantage of the lull in the conversation to rummage around the bag in search of a bottle of water. Meanwhile, Harry tried to rearrange his thoughts. It was weird that they didn’t know much about Quidditch, but if the fact that their school was a small summer camp was true - which was weird on its own, if he was being honest - then it made a bit of sense. He wondered if their school was more like those hippie schools that he’d seen around where some children with “special needs” went. Then he shrugged. 

“Guys, I’m sorry, but I think it’s time to end our grand tour for today,” said Paul from the bench next to theirs, a rueful smile on his face. Sally and him had been talking in hushed tones and exasperated expressions for a few minutes while they talked about their schools. Sally sighed, but nodded and smiled.

“Yeah, sorry, but I’m quite tired,” she said, with something that sounded a bit like guilt in her voice. 

“Don’t worry,” smiled Annabeth. “I could do with a nap myself. Plus, I want to try the ideas I got from the museum.”

“Sounds good,” grunted Percy, before he stood up and slung their shared bag over his shoulder again. He arched an eyebrow at Harry. “D’you want to come with us tomorrow too? Or will you be too busy packing?”

“I can come with you in the morning, I think,” he said, if only because he still wanted to talk more with his new relatives and ask more about that strange school. Then he paused, blushed slightly and looked over to Sally and Paul. “If you’d have me, of course.”

“Of course, Harry,” smiled Sally and Harry felt a warm wave go through him. 

Sally gave him money and they ended up taking different taxis, as their hotel was on the other direction. Harry made sure that he still had the precious photos Sally had given him earlier stuffed in his pocket and relaxed on the backseat of the taxi. 

They were mostly family photos from when the sisters were small children. Harry was quite surprised to see that Petunia hadn’t always had such a pronounced horse-face. He was also surprised about how similar his mother and aunt Sally looked. He wondered if, were his mother alive, she would have looked like Sally did now. It was a sad thought that he didn’t really want to dwell on, especially after what had happened just the year before with the Dementors and his only memory of his parents being the most painful memory he had. 

He sneaked into the house, ignored Petunia’s searching gaze, almost as if she had expected Sally to give him something she didn’t approve of - which she did, but Harry wasn’t about to tell her that - and he ignored Vernon and Dudley’s glares as he bolted up the stairs before they could give him chores. 

Harry closed the door to his room and immediately stuffed the photos in his trunk. His relatives never dared to look in it, fearing that it would turn them into pigs or something. Harry didn’t really care - it played to his advantage. All his secret and valuable objects went directly in there. He did the same at Hogwarts, but at least at Hogwarts people were slightly less nosy. At least when it came to rummaging through someone’s things; the rumor mill at Hogwarts was the fastest Harry had seen in his life. 

Hedwig chirped at him and he gave her a smile. His eyes fell on the roll of parchment he had left on his small desk. Once, it had been a History of Magic essay, but now it had become the material he used for his letters to Ron and Hermione. Ron and his family weren’t too good at dealing with muggle technology (telephones, for example) or anything muggle, really, as he knew from experience. He wondered if he should write to Sirius about this new development, but then decided against it. If he had a moment when he was staying at the Burrow after the Cup, he would write to him, but he didn’t want to send it now that he would leave nearly a bit over a day later. 

In any case, he had quite a few things to tell his friends. 

…

Harry knew that it wasn’t his best idea, but he had to try. 

“Do you know anything about Voldemort?” he asked the next day. 

They were looking at the Big Ben from the street in front of it. They had walked past the London Eye a few moments before and Harry had asked them if they didn’t want to try it. Percy had looked up, his eyes had widened a fraction and then he had laughed nervously as he declined. He mentioned being afraid of being high up and Harry nodded, even if he felt a bit bad for him; that meant that he wouldn’t try riding a broom, which was a total shame, in Harry’s opinion. 

“What? Valdemart? Sounds like a supermarket,” he said, nose scrunched up as he looked down from where he had been staring at the giant clock. Annabeth lowered her camera and shook her head at Harry.

“No, we don’t know about him,” she said. “Is he someone important?”

“You… could say that,” agreed Harry, half-heartedly. He remembered how Ron’s family always flinched when he said  _ his  _ name and how the wizards always made up stupid codenames for him. 

_ Yeah, you could say that he’s someone important. _

“Something wrong?” asked Percy, and it was only then that Harry noticed how he’d stayed quiet for a few moments, staring at the floor. 

“It’s just that…” started Harry, and then he grunted when he didn’t even know how to explain the mess that was wizarding England. “Look, Voldemort is a really powerful wizard that wants to reign over the world. Not only the wizarding world, though. The whole world. He thinks that wizards are better than muggles, than non-magical people.”

Percy and Annabeth crossed a worried glance. Harry frowned. They hadn’t heard about him? He didn’t know if other countries had better things to do, but if they could help them with the rising of a Dark Lord, that would be really helpful, thank you very much. But watching their reaction, Harry wondered, not for the first time, if they would need to deal with this issue themselves. 

Percy’s sigh was sharp and, maybe, angry? 

“This Voldy-guy,” he started and Harry was quite surprised by the serious expression that took over his face. Percy had been pretty laid-back, full of dry humour and sarcasm and a calm that Harry had even envied at some point, but now… Now he was almost  _ scary. _ “Is he still alive?”

“They said that he died, but… we’re not sure anymore,” explained Harry. He gulped. “Why?”

Annabeth and Percy crossed glances again. Harry could feel apprehension pressing on his chest like a rope that only continued getting tighter and tighter. 

“Do you know if he had or  _ has  _ any… special allies? Someone that could help him… rise again?” asked Annabeth this time and there was something in her voice that shook Harry to the core and made him wonder if it had been a good idea to ask them in the first place. Still, he racked his mind for any clues. He was quite disappointed when there were less than he’d hoped. 

“I… don’t really know,” he said, almost ripping the words from his throat. “But I know that he’ll rise again at some point.”

Silence. 

“That’s… great,” grunted Percy. 

Harry gulped again. He was grateful that Percy was now directing his wolfish stare at the building in front of him. Harry almost expected it to catch fire under his gaze. 

“We’ll look into it on our end, Harry,” reassured Annabeth, voice much softer than Percy’s, but her eyes were lost in thought as she looked at the camera in her hands. Her fingers fidgeted with the cord, in a similar way as Percy when he got restless. Harry had noticed how similar some of their mannerisms were. Restless fingers and eyes, a focus that jumped all over the place. 

In the end, they didn’t talk as much about their schools. After that tense talk, they had a calm lunch and, after that, Harry had to head back to his relatives’ house to finish packing and try not to piss off anyone. If he stayed any more with Sally and her family, Harry was sure that Petunia would end up locking him out of the house. He wouldn’t complain, but he still had his things inside and he couldn’t intrude in Sally and her family’s hotel room just like that, anyway. It would be more than rude. 

“Take care of yourself, Harry,” said Sally, hugging him before he got into the taxi. Surprisingly, he had to hold back tears. Sally didn’t care about it and just let them fall all over her face as she leaned back to smile at him. “You can write or call us, if you want. I slipped our phone number in the envelope.”

Harry felt himself smile widely at her and decided to hug her again. She didn’t complain and only huffed a watery laugh as she clutched his shoulders. 

Paul gave him a smile and a wink. For all the teachers that Harry had met in his life, he was quite sure that Paul was the best, up there with Professor Lupin. He had this relaxed air about him, he knew tons of myths (he was an English teacher, after all) and his relationship with Sally was a breath of fresh air compared to the one between Petunia and Vernon. Harry had found himself feeling  _ envious _ of Percy himself, before almost slapping himself for being such an asshole. He was going to remedy that. He was  _ not  _ going to lose contact with this gem he had just found. He was going to get along with them. 

Percy put a hand on his shoulder, with his regular lopsided grin on place and glinting sea-green eyes that always made Harry feel as if he could see right through him and see all his secrets. Percy could come as brooding and a troublemaker and, the truth was that he kind of _was_ the later to some extent, but he was also kind and chill and all-around someone that Harry wanted to have around. He was kind of the cool older brother that he’d never had. Sally’s baby was lucky. 

“We’ll tell you if we find anything about that Voldy-shorts guy,” mumbled Percy. Harry almost cracked up. Percy, after an hour of cooling down, had started to call Voldemort all kind of names, until the point when Harry couldn’t figure out if he was being serious or if he was messing with him. “Be careful, don’t do anything that I would do.”

“Noted,” nodded Harry. He had tried to sound serious, but his grin told otherwise. Percy huffed out a laugh and stepped back so Annabeth could give him a short hug. 

Harry hadn’t expected to like Annabeth as much as he did, and yet, here they were. He had expected Percy and her to be the kind of couple that people their age usually were: that is, clingy, sappy, all-around annoying. And they were, sometimes, when they thought that no one was watching, when they held hands and looked at each other as if they were the deity who had created the world. But in general, they were the kind of couple that bantered about stupid things, that joked around, that didn’t make Harry feel like some kind of useless third-wheel and for that, he was grateful. 

Annabeth herself was a refreshing presence. She reminded him of a less tense Hermione. She joked more, she didn’t take rules as seriously as Hermione - in fact, it looked more as if Annabeth was in the same wavelength as Percy when it came to rules, which was, some rules were just plain stupid and worth breaking. She liked to learn stuff and she was crazy intelligent and she had this fierce look in her eyes that told you to not mess with her if you didn't want a pointy thing stuck in you.

“Don’t worry too much about what you told us,” she said, when they separated from their short hug. Her grin was stubborn and confident. “Just live day by day and-”

“-and act on instinct when you need it, I swear, best friend you’ll ever have,” interrupted Percy. Annabeth rolled her eyes and elbowed him on the arm. 

“I thought  _ I _ was your best friend?” she asked, arching an eyebrow. Percy grinned.

“Sorry, but right now you’re my girlfriend, not best friend, that title is now for Grover,” explained Percy. Harry snorted. Annabeth gave a long-suffering sigh, but she was smiling and she had some red on her tanned cheeks. 

“Go on, Harry,” pushed Paul, sending an amused smile at the bantering couple like so many other times. “We don’t want to get you into trouble.”

“If Petunia gives you any trouble, call me and I’ll deal with it,” chirped Sally from where she was sitting a few ways back. 

Harry huffed out a laugh, took a last glance at his relatives and got in the taxi. 

He hoped he could see them again.

…

“So? How was your summer?” asked Ron, completely ignoring Ms Weasley’s yells at the twins. “As terrible as always?”

Harry grinned widely.

“Not at all.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (honestly, i should probably read some summary about the goblet of fire, seeing as i haven't touched it in *years* but you know what? i'll probably continue to rely on my shitty memory until i have an epiphany and finally check the actual plot.)


	5. Our break is broken

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I said before, I come from a very small fandom, so all this love still makes my head explode with hearts. It makes me *so* happy to know that people like this!!

Percy should have expected their innocent little trip to go south at some point. 

It should have been obvious as soon as they learned of his mom and Petunia’s relationship. It should have been obvious as soon as they’d seen how hideous their house was.  _ Di inmortales,  _ they should have seen it coming as soon as Harry told them that a secret world of wizards and witches existed, a world as secret as their own that they didn’t even know about. 

And now Harry had told them about some Spooky Lord who should have died but didn’t and was now planning world domination. It sounded kind of familiar, oh, yeah, maybe because they’d had to deal with something like that mere  _ weeks _ before. 

Percy was disappointed. Disappointed in the world, disappointed in himself for having hope and disappointed in that Voldy-guy who should have been dead. 

“It could be none of our business,” said Annabeth that night, back at the hotel. “We could just- forget about it. Go on with our life.”

Sally and Paul crossed a worried glance from the other side of the room. Percy, who had been trying to block out the world or trying to suffocate himself with the pillow, he didn’t even know himself, rolled his head so he could stare blankly at Annabeth. 

“And what if it’s something serious, uh?” he said, voice completely devoid of emotion, and he knew that he was probably worrying his parents, but he was just too damn  _ tired  _ to really care. “Would it be a good idea to just ignore the problem until it’s staring us in the face?”

Annabeth bit her lip and lowered her head. Percy had read her mind. Of course they thought the same. 

“You’ve just returned from a war,” mumbled Sally. When Percy turned to her, finally sitting on the bed instead of just making his best liquid impression on it, her eyes were pained and her hands had moved to her stomach. “You don’t- you  _ shouldn’t _ be getting involved in another. Not when-”

“Don’t worry, Sally,” said Annabeth, hurriedly, jumping from the bed to take Sally’s hands in hers. Percy sometimes forgot that the both of them were much closer than before, thanks to his pleasant disappearance. “The way Harry put it, we have  _ time _ . And it may not even be our business.” She turned slightly to Percy with a frown. “I don’t know you, but I’m not willing to get involved in a wizarding war when we’re not even wizards ourselves.”

“That’s true,” nodded Percy, even if he knew how painful it would be to turn their back on someone in danger. It was just- they were  _ tired.  _ Didn’t they deserve a break, after going through literal Hell, after dealing with the pressure of-?

“We’re just going to check it out, see what’s going on, and then we’ll decide what to do,” said Annabeth, this time looking Sally straight in the eyes with her usual fierceness. “We’ll be  _ fine. _ ”

It sounded more like a reassurance to herself than to Sally, really, and Percy found himself clinging to her words. They would be fine, they would deal with whatever came their way. 

They had to.

…

You know what? Percy was actually grateful for the pack of hellhounds that decided to crash the party that very same afternoon.

Honestly, Percy had been waiting for them. There were two demigods in London--maybe even more--and no monster attacks? Please, they weren’t that lucky. 

Annabeth and him had acceded to have a walk around the area near their hotel after Sally practically shoved them out the door, telling them to unwind and clear their heads and maybe take a few photos and have a private date like the one in Paris? Percy and Annabeth had blushed, but smiled at each other and huffed out a laugh that released some of the tension on their shoulders. 

They had managed to visit a few things and take a few silly photos that Percy knew would decorate part of his wall when they returned home, when they finally saw a pack of hellhounds coming towards them. For a moment, Percy had hoped that they were Nico’s idea of a joke, but when one of them lunged at them and Annabeth unsheathed the new dagger she had hidden in her belt to slash at its paw, Percy couldn’t stop his sigh, before reaching for Riptide.

The fight wasn’t even that long, which was actually kind of disappointing, seeing as Percy was using it to unleash all the tension he’d accumulated that very same day. A few slashes, a few kicks and after a few seconds, the hellhounds were gone in a cloud of golden dust that glinted under the orange sky. 

“I guess these are now too easy for us to dispose of, after all that happened,” hummed Annabeth, sheathing her dagger back in her belt. It was new and, even if Percy knew that Annabeth still missed her old dagger, it was more practical and easy to hide than her sword. 

“I just wish that Hades would keep a closer eye on them,” grumbled Percy, stuffing Riptide back in his pocket. Then he blinked. 

He shifted his foot slightly and looked back with the excuse of adjusting his hoodie. There. He hadn’t imagined it. He frowned.

There was a shadow, hiding behind a corner. Percy wondered if they thought they were being sneaky or if they were  _ that _ stupid, but that was enough time for the person to realize that they had been spotted. To no one’s surprise, the mysterious person bolted. 

Percy didn’t waste time, either, and with a sharp nod at Annabeth, both of them ran behind the shadow. They were lucky they weren’t at the heart of London, Percy was quite sure that even his mastered ability to run through crowds that he’d learned living in New York wouldn’t help him to catch the person. Still, the person was like a snake, moving through the few people that were mingling about the streets with an ease that Percy and Annabeth couldn’t match. 

For a moment, Percy thought about jumping on top of a roof or something and just go behind whoever it was, but by that time they both knew that it was too late. The person had disappeared like smoke, leaving no trace behind. 

“Who do you think that was?” asked Percy, leaning against a streetlamp to catch his breath in a way that wouldn’t be too suspicious. Annabeth hummed, lost in thought, but then she sighed and shook her head. 

“Honestly? I don’t know,” she said, dejected. She had always hated not knowing something as important as, say, the identity of someone that had been very clearly stalking them and that had (probably) seen them battling some hellhounds and who could (apparently?) disappear in thin air. “I don’t know if they were from  _ our _ world, or maybe…”

The thought that there was another secret world apart from theirs still put Percy ill at ease. After years of conflict and of near-death experiences, Percy knew better than anyone how important it was to listen to one’s instincts. And if he listened to his now, then it was clear that something was going on. 

They had to talk to Chiron.

...

Chiron didn’t look too surprised by their tale.

They had returned to the hotel in a nearly foul mood that had worried Paul and Sally until they reassured them that they were okay and just wanted to ask Chiron to get it over with. The married pair decided to have dinner at the hotel, so they headed down to get them a table while they talked to Chiron. Mr D was still gone when they called and he would be for some more time, which wasn’t really a lose in Percy’s book, seeing as the guy probably hated his guts. Or maybe not, but if he actually cared for Percy and the campers that weren’t his son, then he was doing an amazingly bad job of it. 

“You know something, don’t you?” asked Annabeth with a sigh. She was hugging one of the pillows to her chest, leaning against Percy, as if she was afraid that if she stopped touching him, he would disappear. Percy didn’t blame her. 

“Not as much as I would like, if I’m being honest,” was Chiron’s answer and his next sigh was long and tired. Percy could relate. “I only know of wizards because Hecate mentioned them once or twice. They have her blessing, as it’s obvious. They started from nothing, and now they have a complex civilization hidden from the eyes of the rest of the world. Even from ours.”

“So they really exist,” mumbled Percy, mostly to himself. A part of him had doubted Harry’s words. He felt guilty, thinking that his cousin was crazy, but he hadn’t seen any proof of it. It wasn’t like his first glance at the mythological world, which had been a death match between his teacher-turned-monster and him. 

“They do, but I’m afraid that I don’t know much about this Voldemort you speak of,” said Chiron, lowering his head with considering eyes. “But, if what Harry said is true, then maybe we should make sure that it really doesn’t tie back to our ‘world’, so to speak.”

“Great, there goes our peaceful life again,” grunted Percy. Chiron’s smile was rueful and his eyes were pained when he finally lifted his head. 

“Don’t worry, we have time,” said Chiron. “Even if it turns out to be our problem, we don’t even have a prophecy yet, which is a good sign. You can rest. Leave the digging to us, for now.”

“Thank you, Chiron,” said Annabeth, nodding slightly, with a slight smile that was more tired than worried. 

“Enjoy your vacation, and if you see any other people like today’s, chase them and try to get information out of them,” continued Chiron. After that, he reached out with a hand and glinting eyes and slashed the projection. 

Percy let out a long sigh and leaned back on the bed, closing his eyes. 

“I bet that Rachel will have a prophecy tonight, you’ll see,” he said. He couldn’t keep the bitterness out of his voice and Annabeth caught on it with no trouble, so she pressed more firmly against him with a soft breath.

“Or maybe not,” she said, but even Percy could tell that she didn’t really believe it. 

“Let’s just…” he mumbled and he rubbed his eyes, before standing up from the bed. “Let’s just enjoy dinner. Do what Chiron said, have a good vacation.”

“We’ll deal with the rest when we get back,” nodded Annabeth.

…

Percy spent the next two days completely ignoring the fact that they were  _ this _ close to another conflict. 

Instead, he dedicated all his attention (or, you know, as much as he could, seeing as his focus was like a rollercoaster sometimes) to his family. He spent a lot of time making jokes with Paul when they were bored in the museums they visited, which were a lot, considering that Annabeth and Sally had made this weird alliance to drag them to as many museums as they could. He always kept a close eye on his mother. After all, she was still pregnant, even if it was for a few months. He was always there when she showed any sign of being tired and pushed her so she would sit down for a moment. She always sent an amused glare at him, but she relented. He also spent as much time as he could with Annabeth. Part of him was incredibly grateful for her usual reassuring presence, like a constant in his life that refused to move, like a rock, or a mountain, and part of him wanted to make up for the time they had lost. 

If he was being honest, the little trip was doing wonders for their mood. Sure, they still struggled with what had happened in Tartarus, with the battle against Gaea, but it seemed far away. They were in an entirely different country. Everything was different. Annabeth liked to say that it was like their perspective of the world had changed. It made it easier for them to distance themselves from the past and focus on the present. Percy didn’t know what would happen once they were back at New York and Camp Half-Blood, especially now that they had new worries to take into account, but he hoped that reality wouldn’t be as stifling as it had been before, at least. 

They took more photos between giggles and bad jokes, they bought corny souvenirs from gift shops as presents for their friends and a few more horrendous souvenirs to decorate the Big House, like the famous red telephone boxes and an umbrella that said “I love London”. They almost bought a bottle of alcohol for the Travis brothers, but Sally reminded them that they wouldn’t be able to get it past airport security. That was the true tragedy.

It was the morning before they would leave London when Percy accidentally almost threw Annabeth’s notebook out the window. 

Like the previous days, the moments before going out for breakfast were absolute chaos in their room, with Sally and Paul discussing what they could visit and how much money they would need for the day, Annabeth trying to tame her hair in the bathroom and Percy trying to stuff everything into their shared bag with the power of his will alone while he mumbled about how useless mosquito repellent was. 

He was doing exactly that, leaning on the wall next to one of the open windows in their room, trying to stuff Annabeth’s notebook into the bag, glaring at it and mentally cursing it, when  _ something _ landed on the windowsill. 

Now, Percy could be considered a veteran demigod, seeing as he’d been dealing with the mythological world’s bullshit for quite some time now, so it was no wonder that he had developed some pretty good reflexes. Reflexes that were meant more for dealing with enemies and less for dealing with everyday life.

So, he jumped and tried to smack whatever had landed next to him with the notebook that was still in his hands. He didn’t even know what it was, but nothing approached a demigod without the intent to kill. Usually.

He heard Annabeth’s screech from behind him and, finally, he focused on what had landed on the window sill and was now glaring at him with murderous dark eyes. 

Uh, it wasn’t a monster.

It was an owl. 

It was a pretty snowy owl that was looking at him as if he had insulted its entire family and shat on its nest, before setting fire to it. 

He felt his cheeks go warm and he took a few steps back. Annabeth was next to him in half a second, making sure that her notebook was intact, and Percy gave it to her without paying much attention, hands trembling slightly and eyes still focused on the bird. He frowned. What was that on its leg?

“What’s that?” mumbled Sally, and she walked closer to the owl. 

Percy reached out with a hand, maybe to tell her to be careful, but then hit a blank, because, why would she need to be careful? It was just an owl. Sure, it looked like it would be  _ very _ happy to kill him, but he was quite sure that it was because he had nearly smacked it out of a twenty-story window. Or maybe because owls were Athena’s thing and Athena didn’t really get along with his father. 

Sally got closer to the owl and reached out for the piece of paper rolled on its leg. The owl finally stopped giving Percy the stink-eye and turned its attention to Sally, moving its leg so she could get the letter more easily. 

“Is it a letter?” asked Paul, walking closer with a curious gaze.

“Ah, it is,” said Sally, with a small smile. She straightened it out with careful hands and read the name on the envelope. Her smile turned into a weird mix of worry and hope, before she lifted her head and looked at Annabeth and Percy. “It’s from Harry.”

Percy gulped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *beep* uni, like, honestly, *beep* uni.


	6. We survive the fireworks of death

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me: *opens email* *gets hit with hearts and nice comments*  
> me, softly: holy shit
> 
> (on another note, I hope you're all doing good in these trying times!)

With how good his summer had been going, Harry really shouldn't have had hope. It was suspicious. It was stupid. It was, most of all, _disappointing_. 

So when there was a terrorist attack at the Quidditch World Cup and they had to scatter and they learned about something that they probably shouldn't have while a creepy-looking skull and snake shimmered in the air over their heads, Harry didn't even blink. Their- or, well, _his_ luck really wasn't the best to start with, was it? 

He still sulked while they returned to their tent after Mr Weasley had finished talking with the officials running around making sure that everyone was safe, he sulked while they packed all their things and he sulked while they walked towards the Portkey that would transport them back to the Burrow via a nauseating and colorful fall that Harry had only used once and already hated with a burning passion. Couldn’t they use brooms? Sure, it would be a longer trip, but at least he wouldn’t feel like a potato sack dropped from a window. 

He stopped sulking once they saw Ms Weasley running towards them with shaking hands and watery eyes and Harry let her hug him for a few minutes while she mumbled about being extremely worried and how glad she was that they were okay. 

He didn’t think much about his family while the Burrow continued coming alive with all its inhabitants (and a few extra) back. In his defense, he didn’t have practice with it, seeing as he usually tried not to think about his family back at London with the focus Hermione would like to see applied to his studies. 

That is, until he remembered that he now had a few family members that didn’t hate his guts and actually cared about him. 

“Hey, Percy, d’you want some?” was asking Fred, wiggling his eyebrows at his brother as he offered the bag of colorful candies with a grin that let Harry know they were dangerous. 

“Yeah, yeah, we promise they aren’t dangerous,” nodded George by his side, before coughing and muttering, “we think so, at least.”

Percy’s only answer was a deep frown and a glare, before he huffed and lifted his head up. He walked up the stairs with the same air Harry had seen in some of the Ministry members he’d seen around the camp back at the Cup. He heard a door slam closed a few seconds later. Fred and George looked at each other, before shrugging at the same time and skipping away with a glint that Harry knew meant that he _really_ didn’t want to know what they were planning.

Then he paused. 

And cursed. 

“Ms Weasley, do you have any spare parchment?” he asked, peeking into the kitchen. Ron sent him a plea for help with just his eyes while he peeled potatoes, but Harry just smiled innocently at him and looked expectantly at Ms Weasley. 

“Oh, yeah, you can ask Hermione, I think she’s using some of it, dear,” she answered over her shoulder. 

Harry sent another amused grin at Ron, who rolled his eyes with a betrayed expression, before walking up the stairs towards Ginny and Hermione’s shared room. When he entered, he saw that Hermione was the only one there and was writing quickly on a roll of parchment with a school book opened by her side. It didn’t surprise him anymore. Honestly, it would surprise him more if he ran into Hermione laying on the sun without doing anything.

“Can I borrow some parchment? I need to write a letter,” he said, cautiously.

Hermione lifted her head and squinted at him for a moment, before blinking and reaching out for it. She made sure that there weren’t any ink stains on it, before giving it to him with a raised eyebrow. 

“A letter? For Sirius?” she asked. Harry blinked.

“Okay, make that _two_ letters,” he said. 

Hermione shook her head, but didn’t comment on it, turning back to her work with the determined eyes of a warrior. Harry peeked at her opened book and grimaced. History of Magic. He remembered his own History essay that he’d stuffed in his sock pile and decided that he didn’t want to deal with that today. Or maybe ever. 

“So? One of the letters is clearly for Sirius, but the other?” asked Hermione, still writing. Harry wondered how she could absorb all the information while talking, seeing as it was worse than reading the components of a bottle of shampoo. 

“Ah, remember what I told you about that part of my family that I knew nothing about?” said Harry. He had told his friends a bit about it, but he never went too much in detail about it, basically because they were all too worked up about the Cup and then the attack. 

“Yes, you have another aunt, right?” said Hermione, looking up from her work. Harry almost grinned; he had managed to pick her interest. 

“Yeah, and she’s the _best_ ,” he answered, and this time he did grin. He remembered the stack of photos he had hidden in his trunk, far away from his half-finished essay. “I also have an uncle and a cousin. He’s a few years older than us. He also has a girlfriend. They’re both really cool. I’ll tell you guys more later. Right now, I should probably write to them and see if they’re okay.”

“Because of the attack, right?” said Hermione and she nodded, the little smile that had appeared on her face fading into a worried frown as she tapped her quill against her chin. 

“Exactly,” nodded Harry. He was quite sure that they were okay, but he wanted to make sure, just in case. He wasn’t about to lose the people he had a bond with. 

He stared at the blank parchment for a moment, finding himself at a loss. He didn’t know how to start. Should he be as formal as if he was talking to one of his teachers? He shook his head immediately, remembering Sally’s grin and Paul’s bad jokes and Percy and Annabeth’s good-natured banter. 

After another minute of hesitation, he decided to just talk to them as if he was talking to Sirius. Thanks to that, he didn’t have as much trouble with it. 

_...I don’t know if you’ve heard, but there was a terrorist attack at the Quidditch World Cup- don’t worry, we’re all okay. I know that you were not exactly close to where it happened, but I just wanted to make sure. I hope you’re okay…_

Harry paused and looked up, tapping his quill against the table. Hermione sent a glare his way, before sniffing and turning back to her work. 

Were they even still at London? He remembered them saying that they would stay there for a week. He made the mental math and nodded to himself. They would stay for a couple more days, before going back to the States. That didn’t mean that Harry wouldn’t be able to send letters to them; Hedwig was amazing. But even his snowy owl couldn’t travel at the speed of light, so it would take a while for the letters to arrive. 

_...Having a good time around London? I’m 90% sure that you’ve already bought some completely horrible souvenirs, but if you need any more ideas, I know of a few pieces of china similar to Petunia’s that you could use to decorate your apartment and probably traumatize whoever goes in there. They have the Big Ben and everything, trust me._

Then he paused and nibbled on his quill. Hermione looked at him as if she expected said object to just explode in his hands - which, now that he thought about it, could happen - and then just went back to her book. 

Hesitantly, he started writing again.

_...Percy, Annabeth, I’m sorry for unloading all that worrying information on you. I’m pretty sure that it’s nothing that could affect you much, so… you know, don’t overthink it too much. We Brits will take care of it, no trouble. Sorry if I put a damp on your holidays._

After a few more bad jokes that he was sure Percy - _his_ Percy - would appreciate, he folded the piece of parchment and looked around for any envelopes. Hermione sighed and pointed at a few of them, shoved to one side of the table carelessly in favour of the history books. Harry sent her a grateful smile, before reaching out for one of them and tucking his letter in carefully. 

Ms. Weasley, Ron and now Ginny were still working diligently at the kitchen, but Harry managed to get to the window with Hedwig without being dragged into any conversation. Maybe it had to do with the fact that Ron and Ginny were bantering over the pots they had to clean and Ms. Weasley was trying - and failing - to get them to stop before either of them or any outside influence could escalate it. 

“Here, Hedwig,” he whispered to the snowy owl, rolling the envelope around Hedwig’s leg and securing it. He smiled at her and she chirped at him. “Give this letter to Aunt Sally and the others. They’ll probably want to send a letter back, so stay with them until they write theirs, okay?”

And with that, Hedwig flew off. 

Harry looked at her until she turned into a small dot in the distance. He hummed to himself. He had thought of writing one to Sirius, but Hedwig would be busy for a bit and he honestly didn’t want to make the tired and old owl of the Weasley family fly all the way to Sirius, especially because he was quite sure that he wasn’t in the country, maybe not even in the continent. He couldn’t do that. 

So, his plan B was to go see what the Weasley twins were up to, which sometimes wasn’t the best idea, but taking into account that if he went back to his room Hermione would see his bored face and drag him to work, it was a much better option. 

He regretted it just a few minutes later.

…

“So? Your new family members?” asked Hermione after dinner, when they had holed themselves in Hermione and Ginny’s shared room. 

Their first plan had been to discuss what had happened at the Cup, but then Hermione had started talking about her new idea to free the elves and the conversation had developed into a trainwreck of thinly veiled insults and glares. Harry was glad for the new topic. 

“Oh, yeah, I didn’t tell you much about them, did I?” he hummed. And he didn’t, really, even if he had said a thing or two about how this past week hadn’t sucked as bad as in other years. He grinned. “Apparently, I have another aunt.”

“Really?” said Ron and he arched an eyebrow. “You don’t seem too hateful towards her. So? Is she actually nice?”

“She’s the best,” nodded Harry, grin never fading as he remembered the one moment where he’d known that Sally Jackson would become one of his favourite people, just after she had confronted Aunt Petunia about their “lost of touch”. “Her name is Sally Jackson and she’s my mum’s younger sister. She lives in New York.”

“That’s… far,” commented Ron and Harry nodded. 

Ron - and his family - had always lived in the wizarding world and, yeah, last year they had traveled to Egypt, but Harry sometimes wondered if the thought of how big the world was scared them. The wizarding world was really small compared to the muggle one and, sure, there were wizards mostly everywhere, but you couldn’t compare their numbers to the muggles'. 

“You said she came with other people, right?” asked Hermione, eyes glinting with the new piece of information. Harry shook his head and he could feel his grin getting wider.

“Yes, she actually has a husband and a son and she’s, uh, she’s pregnant now,” said Harry. Hermione frowned.

“She came all the way here while she was pregnant?” she said, obviously not approving of this fact. Harry shrugged. 

“Yes, I don’t think anyone could stop her, even if they tried,” he said. Was that warmth spreading through his chest normal? It felt warm, as if he was talking about one of his friends to someone who _cared._ Huh. Family.

“Doesn’t that sound familiar,” snorted Ron. Harry arched an eyebrow at him with a small quirk of his lips. 

“It’s quite funny, actually, because my cousin’s name is also Percy, but he’s the total opposite of _your_ Percy,” he said and pointed at Ron with his hand. Ron frowned.

“The total opposite… oh, geez, is he like Fred and George?” he asked, a horrified look taking place in his face. It looked similar to the one he’d had as soon as they figured out that they had needed to follow the spiders into the forest, back in their seconds year. Wow, that felt like an eternity. 

“Uh, more like… us, really,” he said in the end because, yes, sure, Percy had this kind of prankster attitude, especially with Annabeth, but he was more like Harry himself, if he was being honest. “You know, sarcastic, nice, troublemaker material, easygoing… his glare is actually terrifying, though.”

“He sounds like a cool guy, mate,” nodded Ron and Harry almost snorted. Ron’s expectations were always kind of low when it came to people, but taking into account how many people had tried to kill them and how many people at Hogwarts were absolute idiots and jerks, Harry couldn’t blame him. 

“You said he’s around our age, right?” asked Hermione, tilting her head to the side. Harry caught Ron frowning at her, but he didn’t say anything. 

“He’s a few years older than us,” he said, and when Ron’s frown turned into a distrustful glare, he added, “he also came with his girlfriend, Annabeth, she reminds me a bit of you, just more… uh…” ah, crap, he’d backed himself into a corner and now Hermione was staring at him with sharp eyes and _ugh_ , “wild?” Hermione glared. “She can probably stab a guy with a sword, is all I’m saying!”

Hermione arched an eyebrow at him and Ron backed off, so Harry sighed in relief. He really thought that, though. Annabeth was mostly calm, but he could see the fire in her eyes and how agile she was. She could probably use a sword if someone gave it to her. So could Percy, probably. For a moment, he imagined them both wielding the sword of Gryffindor. 

“You could have introduced us,” said Ron, with a disappointed sigh, but then he frowned. “Wait, maybe not, do they know about magic?”

“Oh, you bet they do, Percy and Annabeth are wizards too,” said Harry and his grin was back, just like that. “Isn’t it great?”

“Wow, what are the chances?” mumbled Hermione to herself. Harry frowned at her.

“What do you mean?” he asked. Was Hermione pointing fingers already? They hadn’t even started school. What was more, she was accusing the few family members that actually _cared_ about him, what the hell?

“I mean, your mother was a muggleborn, right?” pointed out Hermione, with a deep frown and unfocused eyes as she tapped her fingers on her chin. “And now her nephew is a muggleborn too?”

“Percy’s father could be a wizard, Hermione,” said Ron, rolling his eyes. Hermione blinked and blushed slightly, but Harry didn’t drop his frown. 

“Paul didn’t act like a wizard,” he mumbled. Hermione looked at him with suspicion again and Ron sighed, slumping back against a bed. Harry shook his head. “Then again, Percy didn’t look like Paul. At all. He resembled Sally somewhat, but… not that much, actually.” 

“Maybe that Paul is just Percy’s stepfather,” said Hermione, biting her lip. Harry blinked, and then he looked up, eyes wide.

“That would explain why Aunt Petunia doesn’t like Aunt Sally,” he breathed. 

His mind went over all the things he knew about the family, which wasn’t that much, actually. He remembered hearing Paul’s full name, Sally’s full name. Percy only had Aunt Sally’s last name. The theory had too much sense not to be the truth. If Percy was actually the son of another man, it would explain why Aunt Petunia didn’t like the idea of Aunt Sally visiting, why they had lost touch so thoroughly. Muggle post wasn’t the best, he knew that, but they also had _phones_ . They could have _talked_ if they had wanted to. 

The question was, what had happened to Percy’s biological father? For what he’d seen, Percy’s relationship with Paul was really similar to the one Harry had with Sirius, which meant that it was great and based on bad jokes and tangible bonds. Maybe Percy’s father was dead? An affair? A divorce? 

Maybe he could try asking him when they saw each other next, or even via letter… Or not, he felt kind of awkward asking that by a simple letter. Or even in person. What if his father was _actually_ dead? ‘Oh, hey, yeah, so, Paul isn’t your actual father, is he? So? Who is it?’ He couldn’t say that! Even if Percy didn’t immediately deck him or break down crying, it still lacked tact, not to mention that it was none of his business. For Merlin’s sake, he’d only known them for a few days! Tragic backstories usually took their time. They only knew his because it was common knowledge for everyone and their mother.

“So, they go to Ilvermorny, then, right?” asked Hermione, eyes shining with curiosity. “What is it like?”

“Ilvermorny?” repeated Harry. Hermione got this affronted look that she always got when someone proved to be uncultured and uneducated and-

“The official magic school in the United States,” she explained. She raised her hand towards her desk, probably to dig out a book about it, its story and who knew what more, but Harry cut her before she could go on with her tirade.

“They don’t,” he said. Hermione blinked, as if she had fallen when climbing down the stairs and one of them had caved under her foot. Ron, who had been watching them, straightened up with a suspicious frown. “They said that there’s this… I think they called it a camp, where they practice magic. They also said that it’s more practical. Sounds cooler than what we do, really.”

“That’s impossible,” mumbled Hermione. She stood up and started digging around her new desk, murmuring to herself as she eyed books and pieces of paper. “There aren’t… That makes no sense… How…?”

Harry and Ron looked at each other with confused glances, before Ron shrugged and continued watching as Hermione mumbled to herself while trying to make sense of this new piece of information. Harry could admit to being confused about their way of doing things, basically because he had never heard of it. Still…

“They mentioned that it was really small, Hermione,” said Harry, when he saw Hermione fall down on the floor cradling a book as she turned the pages at an incredible speed. He touched her shoulder, almost afraid of what she would do, if she would stab him with the spine of the book in her hands, but nothing happened beyond Hermione focusing her lost eyes on him. “They said that not many people know about it.”

“Wizards still need to go to magic school, Harry,” pointed out Hermione, almost desperately, as she clutched the book tighter in her hands. 

Harry racked his brain for any more clues, because if this continued, he might start being suspicious of the only family members (by blood) that actually gave a damn about him. 

Like a ray of light, he remembered Percy and Annabeth’s squinting eyes when they had been resting at one of the cafes around a park. The couple had been trying to read a menu, before just shoving it at a startled Harry with a defeated expression. He had read what they pointed at with confusion clear in his eyes, before Percy explained that they both had dyslexia and some fonts were a complete nightmare to read. 

“They have dyslexia,” he blurted out. Hermione, who had returned to her book, whipped her head towards him so quickly, Harry wondered if she wasn’t dizy. He gulped. “They told me that they had dyslexia. Maybe that place is some kind of… special school or something?”

“Could be…” mumbled Hermione. She lowered her head, but she wasn’t as nervous and erratic as before. She bit her lip for a few more seconds in which Harry and Ron prayed for her to stop obsessing over those things. Finally, she sighed. “Fine, but when we get to Hogwarts, I’ll look it up. Just in case.”

Harry let out a sigh of relief. 

…

Hedwig returned a day later, carrying a letter from Aunt Sally and the rest. 

Harry had already written the one that would go to Sirius, so he only exchanged the letters on Hedwigs’s leg, let her rest for a few hours, and then watched her go, probably for a much longer trip. 

He was lucky the Weasleys were bickering about something or other at the kitchen table, because it made it much easier to just sneak away to his shared room. Percy (Weasley) was still stuck in his room, probably dealing with useless paperwork. Harry didn’t envy him, even if the other boy felt like they all should. 

The new letter was written in a myriad of different handwritings. 

The first part was obviously in Paul’s handwriting. Harry didn’t know why, but all teachers seemed to have a similar handwriting, so he could make it out without even wanting to or even trying. It reassured Harry that they were all perfectly fine and they asked about his well being with worry and an offer to talk if he wanted to. It made Harry smile genuinely. The warm feeling in his chest was back. 

Paul’s part also narrated some of their adventures through London and listed a few of the souvenirs that they had bought. It also said how devastated the two ‘troublemakers’ were when they learned that airport security was a thing that existed and how it wouldn’t let them act as traffickers with special alcohol and sweets for their friends back at New York. Harry wondered for a moment if those friends would be wizards too, but then decided not to dwell on that too much; Merlin knew that Hermione was doing enough of that for all the house combined. 

The last part was shorter, written in a loopy handwriting that was clearly rushed or not very careful, maybe even messy. It was apparently Annabeth’s, for what it said, and Harry arched an eyebrow at it.

_...We talked about what you told us with one of our teachers. He didn’t know anything about Voldemort, but he did say that he would look into it. We wondered if you could tell us your headmaster’s name and some way to contact them? It would be really helpful._

_By the way, your owl is really nice. She doesn’t like Percy very much, though. Then again, that could be because she startled him and he almost threw her out a window with my notebook._

They wanted to talk to Professor Dumbledore? That was surprising. 

Maybe he would regret it, but right then, he made a decision that would drive Hermione up the wall with how reckless it was.

He wrote Dumbledore’s contact info on a piece of paper and, when Hedwig returned a few days later, he tied it to her leg and sent her away again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know how JK said that wizards don’t get mental illnesses? Yeah, fuck that.


	7. Meeting Gandalf 2.0

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Geez, the support I'm getting for this is amazing, every single comment and kudos makes me smile, guys, I don't even know what to say ahhhh

The souvenirs were a total hit when they returned to Camp Half-Blood, the day after they had landed and after a long nap that lasted ten hours without being interrupted with nightmares of the end of the world, for a change, which was nice. 

In their absence, Calypso’s garden, next to the strawberry fields, was taking shape and some of the cabins were mostly done and there were already some campers that were sleeping in them. They also learned that Leo had started working on a new Argo II (would that make it the Argo III?), saying that it would help a lot with communication between the two camps. Shadow travel was still a thing, of course, especially now that Nico was a more common visitor to the camp, but it was still really exhausting for him and Hazel, so it would be best to think of other ways. Case in point, the new Argo. Percy didn’t know if the idea would be well-received at Camp Jupiter, seeing as the last Argo had attacked them, but he allowed himself to have some hope. 

“What is this about wizards and a new war?” asked Piper, just after they had finished making rounds around the camp and giving out some souvenirs like some kind of Santa Claus and were walking towards the Big House to talk with Chiron. 

“It’s still impossible to keep classified information  _ classified  _ around here, isn’t it?” grumbled Percy, rubbing his face. Annabeth snorted by his side. 

“You know better than that,” she said. Piper grinned innocently. 

“Oh, no, nothing like that, it’s just that we’ve been helping Chiron with digging around for more information,” she explained. Annabeth quirked an eyebrow at her and Piper’s grin widened. “It’s just Jason, Nico, Will, Grover, Rachel and I. For now.”

“For now,” repeated Percy. He could feel his will to live escape out of his ears. Well, at least, you know, it wasn’t common knowledge for the entire camp. And Camp Jupiter. It was a matter of time, though. Annabeth was right; he knew better. “It would be nice for it to stay like that for a little longer. Until we can figure out what exactly we’re dealing with.”

“Any news?” asked Annabeth, in that serious and business-like tone she always used when they were in their quests. It was nostalgic, alright, but it also sent an unpleasant cold feeling up Percy’s spine. Like he’d scratched his back against a icy wall. 

“Not much, really,” was Piper’s answer, and her grin fell slightly as she nodded to the Big House. “We should go with the rest.”

The Big House still had a giant hole on one side, but at least the majority of the rooms were fixed and didn’t have an HD view of the outside through nonexistent walls. Chiron’s office was one of these rooms and where they decided to meet. The meeting room was too suspicious and if anyone saw them talking with worried expressions in there, the next thing that would shake the camp would be an avalanche of mass panic and armed teenagers with severe PTSD with instincts going highwire. Not good. 

Jason was reading a book, sprawled on a sofa, so different from his usual discipline, joined by Nico and Will sitting on the wood floor and talking in hushed tones as they pointed at different pieces of paper with strange symbols on them. Chiron, now back in his wheelchair, looked at them with tired eyes, but when he finally recognized them, he smiled at them. Percy let his shoulders fall. If Chiron could still smile, they weren’t in mortal danger. Yet. 

“How was your trip?” asked Chiron, as he closed one of the books and left it on the table. 

“It was refreshing, not gonna lie,” answered Percy. And it had been. It would have been even more refreshing if they hadn’t learned about wizards and a crazy guy whose name sounded like an American supermarket, but, well. 

“I’ve been to London a few times, it’s always raining,” complained Nico, grimacing slightly. Will snorted by his side. Nico turned to him with an annoyed frown. “What? It is! Did it rain for you?”

“I mean, it did rain one day,” nodded Annabeth, trying and failing to hide her amused grin. Nico gestured to them with a hand while he frowned at Will. Will’s only answer was to shake his head with a wide smile and shining eyes. Annabeth’s grin didn’t stay for long, which was a tragedy, as far as Percy was concerned. “Not to be a mood-killer, but did you find anything?”

“We managed to get our hands on some old newspapers that talked about the previous war with this Voldemort guy,” explained Will, nodding to a pile of newspapers propped against one of the walls like a cheap tower of Pisa. 

“It doesn’t mean much for us, but that could be because we don’t know much about their world to begin with,” continued Jason with a sigh. “Some things are pretty easy to understand, though. Assassinations, kidnappings, dark magic, they’re basically the definition of a terrorist group, really.”

“How did you get those newspapers?” asked Percy, frowning at the pile. He highly doubted that just about anyone could get them, seeing as they didn’t even know the wizards were a thing until they had one of them spell it out for them in their faces. 

“I asked,” was Piper’s answer, coupled with a small smile and glinting eyes. Percy decided not to ask. 

“And about his return?” asked Annabeth, walking towards the pile and eyeing the front page of the one on top. Her eyebrows shot up. “Are the photos  _ moving _ ?”

Percy, who had been leaning against a wall with his arms crossed, shot up and hurried to her. He was used to weird, but honestly,  _ moving photos? _ That was  _ so cool  _ and  _ so harmless _ .

“You’re right, they  _ do _ move,” he breathed as soon as he got a peek at the photo. 

There was a man waving at them from a white and black photo. Percy tried to read the title of the newspaper, but, like with most of the newspaper names, the words were printed in an elegant and cursive type of font, which made it basically impossible for him to make sense of them. It didn’t really matter for him, though.  _ Moving photos.  _

“Apparently, their photos can move,” said Piper, eyes shining. “I wonder how they do it? Wouldn’t it be cool to take photos like that?”

“There’s not much about Voldemort’s supposed return,” explained Chiron, before their conversation went off-course like always. He sighed. “Unfortunately, your cousin Harry was right. The only mentions of that nowadays are summaries of your cousin’s life story and critics toward the headmaster of his school for not protecting the students as much as he should.”

“Speaking of, I asked him for some contact info. With any luck, we can talk with the headmaster of his school,” said Percy, leaning back from where he’d been looking at some of the newspapers Annabeth had taken from the pile and strewn on the floor around her. Chiron nodded.

“Thank you, Percy,” he said. 

“We also told Harry that we’re wizards ourselves,” said Annabeth from her new seat between newspapers. “We had to explain our powers to him somehow. It played in our favor, because we got some information about the, uh, wizarding world.”

“And he bought it?” asked Nico, arching an eyebrow at them with distrust. Percy shrugged.

“Apparently,” he answered. “We were in the middle of town, so we couldn’t exactly demonstrate, anyway. Good thing we were, really.” Then he frowned deeply. “Wait, you said that they were talking about Harry? What are they saying about him?”

“Nothing good, but it could be worse,” answered Nico, with a slight grimace.

Annabeth digged around the newspapers, a frown clear on her face, while Percy glared at the pieces of paper as if they had insulted his family, which Percy was quite sure they did, so it didn’t help to quell his anger. He had only known Harry for a few days, but he cared about him. There was something in his green eyes that was pretty familiar to him. It had taken him a few days to realize that what he saw in Harry’s eyes was what he had seen in his own when he had been younger, when he had started to realize just how fucked up everything about his new reality was. A part of him didn’t want Harry to change like him, he didn’t want to see Harry see the world with his own heavy eyes. He didn’t want Harry to carry the weight he carried himself or see the things he had seen. And yet, there was something telling him that there was nothing he could do to stop it. It was the same feeling he always got when he tried to go against the prophecies, the feeling of hopelessness in the face of fate. He didn’t like it.

“Here,” said Annabeth, jaw clenched tight, as she offered him a newspaper. Percy frowned, but took it, nevertheless. 

He didn’t bother to look at the name of the newspaper; he was quite sure that it was the same every time. Instead, he focused on reading the article that Annabeth pointed at him. It was slow-going, and sometimes Percy wanted nothing more than to just drop the newspaper, especially after reading what exactly they said about his newfound cousin. He ended up lifting his head with his lips curled in something that neared a snarl and he had to consciously stop his hands from shaking. He also had to stop his mind from calling forth a devastating storm that hit New York and probably destroyed the newspaper’s office. 

The Boy Who Lived. His parents were murdered. The tales he told from previous years are only stories from a traumatized teenager that only wants attention.

Annabeth closed her fingers around his forearm and Percy took a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment until the roaring in his ears that sounded suspiciously like a hurricane in the middle of the sea stopped. 

“In any case, Rachel doesn’t have any prophecies for us, for now,” said Will, leaning back on his hands as he stretched his back. “That’s probably good.”

“The Gods are too preoccupied with dealing with the aftermath of the war to pay us much mind,” continued Chiron. “If things start going south and we need to step in, we still need to talk with them. The wizards are Hecate’s responsibility, after all.”

“So, just wait and see, uh?” mumbled Percy. Chiron looked him in the eye and nodded, slowly. 

Percy let out a sigh and dropped the offending newspaper on top of a few others, rubbing his eyes. Stupid jet lag. It didn’t help that his ten-hour-long nap had only managed to make him even drowsier and stiff. He wondered if this was how Hypnos’ sons and daughters felt like at all times. He didn’t like it. 

Annabeth seemed to be on the same boat, if Percy had to guess from her own hidden yawns and the way she stretched her arms over her head. Chiron’s eyes softened. 

“Go rest, you two,” he said with a small smile. “You have just returned from a long trip to another continent and you still have a few leftover injuries from the battle, don’t you?” Annabeth and Percy could only nod like two chastised children. Chiron’s smile widened. “Go back home. Rest. We’ll continue another day.”

When they left the Big House, a few of their friends still came to them to thank them for the souvenirs. The Stoll brothers smiled at them with innocent smiles, but their eyes shone with the fires of hell - not capital H Hell, more like, school level of hell, but still bad. Annabeth and Percy had been at camp long enough to know that whatever they were planning wasn’t any of their business. At all. It was better if they didn’t know about it, because when someone came to them a few hours later asking about anything that was missing (be it an object or a person), they wouldn’t have to deal with it. Clarisse grunted at them, so Percy guessed that she had liked her ornamental sword that was based off King Arthur’s. There were still explosions coming from Leo and Calypso’s shed, so they decided to greet them another day when they weren’t in danger of catching fire.

They spent the rest of the day at Sally and Paul’s apartment, decorating Percy’s wall with photos, not only from this past trip, but with all the photos they had. Percy didn’t hesitate to put up the one Annabeth had sent him years ago, the one he had printed out and stared at for an embarrassingly long time. Annabeth herself had been surprised and had even blushed, but when Percy turned his back on her to grab a few more photos, he had seen the little soft smile on her face as she looked at it with fond eyes. 

Then came the deja vu, because really, was this going to be a recurring theme or what?

Something landed on his windowsill and, for a moment, he almost expected Nico to walk into his room like other times, bitching at him and complaining at him about something or other. But no, he saw a winged silhouette perched on it and his instincts, always so helpful, told him to chuck one of his school books to it. He was going to do just that, before Annabeth grabbed his arm and stopped him with a pointed glance. 

It was an owl. 

It was Hedwig. Harry’s owl. 

And she had a note around her leg.

Percy sighed and relaxed his shoulders. It seemed things were moving quite fast, which he honestly didn’t know if it was good or bad.

Time for some real answers.

…

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore - and wasn’t that a complete _ mouthful _ \- was the headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry -  _ another _ mouthful with a funny name. It seemed like wizards usually used owls to communicate with one another, which was weird, because didn’t they have phones? In what age did they  _ live in _ ? Did they even have fast food? TV? Probably not, and that was sad, no matter how many spectacular shit they could do. Percy could control the  _ sea _ and he could still watch his favourite series on TV. Then again, demigods didn’t really use phones either because yeah, attracting all monsters in the vicinity wasn’t the best evening plan, but  _ owls? _ Didn’t they have an equivalent of IM or something? 

_ In any case _ , Chiron managed to get an owl that would serve as their messenger while they talked with that Dumbledore person through mail. It wasn’t optimal, not by any means, but they couldn’t just IM him and see what happened. They would try to stay hidden as long as they could, but something told Percy that they wouldn’t be able to keep it up for long, especially if they needed to trust each other, which was the basic principle if they ended up making an alliance to deal with the Voldy guy. 

Chiron acted as their little “school’s” headmaster in his letters to the Professor, asking about the situation, saying that one of his students (Percy) had told him what his cousin (Harry) had explained to him a few weeks before. 

By that time, the first day of classes was close and Percy found himself looking at the calendar stuck to their apartment wall with apprehensive eyes. His mother tried to get his mind off things, asking him about how Rachel was doing, if he had everything ready and Paul gave his two cents, of course, giving him advice on how to tackle the new year, joking with him, taking him out to eat and walk. His high school had been nice enough to let him continue on to his Senior year if he took some extra classes to help him get back to speed, after all. They even talked a lot about the baby, about how Sally had craved seafood coupled with fruits at some point when she was pregnant with Percy. They celebrated his birthday with Annabeth’s, going out for dinner, just the four of them and then another dinner where it was just Percy and Annabeth. 

And yet, Percy could feel in his gut how the normal year that he had wished for was getting further and further away with every letter that landed on Chiron’s office.

Professor Dumbledore, once he had made sure that Chiron wasn’t actually plotting their demise, had admitted that the situation didn’t look too good. He gave some more information about Voldemort and when Chiron told them about it, it sent an unpleasant shiver down his back. 

After that, there was no argument. Percy and Annabeth ended up going to their respective schools and telling them that the previous family business they were dealing with and had thought was finished was, actually, not that finished and they didn’t know when it would be. 

Percy almost burst out crying when his high school ended up giving him the notes for his subjects and the contact information for his teachers. He was quite sure that it had been Paul’s doing. The secretary didn’t look too thrilled about it at first, looking him up and down with a frown, but then she had taken a look at Percy’s face and shoved the tower of papers at him, telling him not to worry, that he didn’t deserve to lose another year because of his family business when he truly wanted to study and wished him good luck with whatever he was dealing with, which only managed to make Percy have to swallow the lump in his throat so he could thank her with a watery smile. 

Annabeth herself would do something similar with her own school. She said over dinner one day that her family didn’t mind too much. She had visited them, of course, even if Percy had been dubious about her going away for a few days. He didn’t know why, though. Maybe it was because they had gone through too much together.

In any case, they would meet with Professor Dumbledore that very same day. Apparently, wizards could teletransport.  _ Teletransport. _ Was this some kind of sci-fi movie? What more could they do? Could they do the typical bunny-in-a-hat thing? Or was that too stereotypical of him? He was a demigod and his life was basically a mythology legend on itself, so he didn’t know if it would be the same for others. 

The meeting would be in the Big House, between Chiron, this Dumbledore person, Annabeth, Nico, Jason and Percy himself. Percy was quite sure that he could cut the tension floating in the air with Riptide if he wanted to and if Chiron wasn’t already keeping an eye on his hands as he fidgeted with the pen.

Then the space in front of the coffee table twisted, folded in on itself and all the present demigods jumped, hands flying to their weapons. Percy uncapped Riptide for real this time. Annabeth and Nico unsheathed their swords. Jason reached out for his new spear. Chiron, calm as always, only raised a hand. They stood down and hid their weapons quickly and carefully as the newcomer appeared in front of them.

Dumbledore was really tall, with long white hair and beard, glasses and twinkling blue eyes. They weren’t like Piper’s, though, they didn’t change color, but they were still a bit… unsettling. He was also wearing what Percy thought was a toga at first, but then he noticed that it was more like… robes. Uh. Classy. 

“Good evening, or I guess it’s good morning here. I suppose you’re Mr Chiron, am I wrong?” greeted the wizard with a small smile as he reached out with a hand. Chiron shook it with his own smile.

“I am. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Professor Dumbledore,” said Chiron. Dumbledore nodded politely and turned to them. Percy’s eyes focused on the stick the wizard clutched in his hand and he frowned at it. 

“Please, call me Albus,” continued the Professor, looking around with sharp eyes. Percy’s frown deepened. Hiding their true identities from this man would be difficult, if not impossible. Dumbledore’s gaze fell on him immediately and his lips turned up into a smile. “Ah, I suppose you’re Harry’s cousin, then? You look quite similar.”

“I am,” nodded Percy, and after a short moment of hesitation and mistrust, offered a hand to the Professor, with a crooked smile taking place on his face. “Though, from our mothers’ side. If we have similar hair and eyes, that’s completely coincidental.”

“I see, I see,” mumbled Dumbledore and Percy was tempted to ask him what exactly he saw, because something told him that he wasn’t referring to what Percy had just said. Then Dumbledore looked around at the other three seated all around the room with considering and cautious eyes. “Are you three also students of this school? Pardon me, but I honestly hadn’t heard of it until Mr Chiron here wrote to me a few weeks ago.”

Their gazes met, before turning as one to Chiron. 

Chiron’s only answer was to sigh.

“Please, sit down. We have much to talk about.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chap will also be from Percy's pov because, wow, that would be... that would be a *big* chap otherwise.


	8. We decide to play James Bond among wizards

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sending so many fucking hearts to the people who commented on this because wow guys you literally make my days 100000 times better every single time.

Piper came back a few minutes later with a few cups of tea and coffee that she set on the low coffee table in the middle of the sofas, before leaning down to Percy, Annabeth and Chiron.

“The Stoll brothers have figured out that you’re on a ‘secret’ meeting with someone from outside, so be careful,” she whispered at them. Percy tried not to show his worry on his face, but if he had to guess from Dumbledore’s reaction, he was sure that he had failed. Dumbledore looked away politely. “I’ll try to keep them away, but I can’t make any promises. You know how they are.”

And with that, she was gone after giving them all a small smile to wish them luck.

There was brief silence between them, until Chiron sighed softly again and leaned back on his wheelchair with his cup on his lap. 

“Before we go into everything in more detail, I must admit that I haven’t been entirely truthful with you, Albus,” said Chiron, voice and smile rueful. 

Dumbledore’s eyes focused on him, considering, but not fully mistrustful or alarmed. The present demigods turned to Chiron with wide eyes. He was telling the truth already? So soon? He probably saw the same that Percy himself had noticed, but even then, they could have  _ tried  _ to keep it a secret for a longer time until there was no other option but to say the truth. Then again, they were here and now to form an alliance and lying at their probable allies’ face wasn’t the best strategy.  _ Still. _

“Mm, does it have anything to do with this, ah,  _ special school _ ?” asked Dumbledore, gesturing to his surroundings with his free hand. His stick was gone. Was it like some kind of wand or something? Did wizards have wands? Or did they just wave their hands all over the place and think about what they wanted to do like most demigods did with their extra powers?

“Yes, exactly,” nodded Chiron. Annabeth was frowning at him, but after a few seconds of probably running possibilities through her mind, she nodded slightly and looked ahead. Percy took her hand discreetly and she looked at him with clear and sure eyes. Okay then. Everything was well. “This isn’t a wizardry school. Something close to it, but not quite.”

Dumbledore mulled it over for a few seconds in which no one spoke. 

“And yet, you’re still willing to help us with our problem?” he asked, voice much more severe than before, heavier, the same tone of voice that Chiron had always used before their most gruesome battles. It made Percy tense in anticipation, before he remembered that there weren’t any battles nearby. Hopefully. 

“We are worried about what your… conflict would mean for both our worlds,” tried to explain Chiron. Dumbledore frowned for the first time since he got there. 

“ _Both_ worlds?” repeated Dumbledore. His eyes, which had been some semblance of warm under all the caution, now looked cold and calculating, like two blocks of ice. “You’re not wizards?”

“I suppose you know about the Greek Gods?” asked Chiron with a rueful smile. Dumbledore stared at him for a few moments, uncomprehending, before his eyes lighted up in recognition. 

“Ah, the legends,” he breathed. It was a genuine reaction, as far as Percy could tell, which was a lot, seeing as he had become some sort of expert when it came to the expressions teachers used to make. He’d had to learn, if he’d wanted to try and sway his teachers from giving him too much detention from something out of his control like, for example, a chimera attack just outside the school gym. “So these children…”

“They’re demigods,” nodded Chiron. “I’m sorry, but we don’t feel comfortable enough to give you more information than that, for now.”

_ For now _ , which was a clear invitation for the alliance that they wanted to form. Dumbledore gazed at all of them with considering and curious eyes, almost looking at them as if it was the first time seeing them. It reminded him of when he had told Paul about who exactly he was. Paul had also looked at him - and then Annabeth when she visited - as if he was looking at him for the first time, as if he was a different person. It didn’t last long, because Percy made sure to be his usual sarcastic and (unwillingly) troublemaking self around him. 

Dumbledore’s eyes finally rested on Percy and Percy found himself meeting his gaze head-on, without backing down. 

“Your family is a really interesting one, young Percy,” said Dumbledore with a small smile. Percy gave him a crooked smile in return.

“Seems so, Professor,” he said as an answer. He had to bite his tongue to keep himself from blurting out ‘yeah, you’re telling  _ me _ about  _ interesting _ families’. He honestly didn’t want to dwell too much on that specific topic. 

“I see now, your assistance would be very much appreciated and needed, I’m afraid,” said Dumbledore, after a long sigh. “I’m afraid that Voldemort will rise again soon.”

“How soon?” asked Annabeth, finally taking part in the conversation. She leaned forward when Dumbledore’s eyes focused on her, still considering. “Is your school compromised?”

“We also heard something about a prophecy?” asked Nico, even if his voice was sharper than Annabeth’s and his question ended up sounding more like a demand. 

“Yes, soon, Miss and Mister…” answered Dumbledore and he trailed off, looking at the two demigods, expectant.

“Annabeth Chase,” nodded in greeting Annabeth, quick and to the point, as always. It made Percy’s lips twitch upwards.

“And Nico di Angelo,” continued Nico, expression still serious, arms tightly crossed over his chest. It was almost a surprise that he wasn’t fidgeting with his ring. 

“And to answer your other questions, I don’t think my school is compromised right now, but it could be,” admitted Dumbledore, looking almost regretful. At Chiron’s arched eyebrow and Annabeth’s confused frown, he continued. “Hogwarts is hosting an international competition where two other schools will participate. I can make sure that Hogwarts is well protected, but if someone else comes from another school with malicious intent, I’d be none the wiser, I’m afraid.” His eyes moved shortly to Nico. “As for the prophecy… it talks about a revived Voldemort. If we can stop him from rising…”

“I’m sorry, but prophecies always come true, one way or another,” said finally Jason. When Dumbledore turned his gaze to him, Jason coughed, slightly awkward. “I’m Jason Grace, by the way.”

“So, Mr Grace, you’re saying that Voldemort  _ will _ rise?” asked Dumbledore. He didn’t sound particularly scared or worried, but his eyes were, yet again, their previous calculating self. 

“That’s exactly what I’m saying, sir,” nodded Jason, eyebrows pinched and lips pressed into a thin line. 

There was a heavy silence again between them. Percy wanted to jump up and probably pace around the room like some kind of worried middle-aged adult, but he managed to control himself and stayed next to Annabeth on the sofa, fidgeting with Riptide still in his hand. 

The situation wasn’t as good as they had hoped. Not only was this spooky guy going to rise from the dead like some kind of bad zombie movie, but there could be trouble in the magic school because some genius decided that  _ now  _ was a good idea to organize some kind of “magic games”. Then again, if the majority of the world was of the firm belief that Dumbledore and Harry and everyone who said that the man of the hour was going to rise and take over the world or something were liars, then he could make sense of it. It was still stupid, though. 

“If I may…” mumbled Chiron, catching the attention of them all. Dumbledore nodded at him to continue. “You said that other schools would go to Hogwarts to participate in these games, right?”

“That’s right,” nodded Dumbledore. “It’s called the Triwizard Tournament.”

Percy sent a frown at Chiron. He didn’t mean to…?

“Then, what if there was another school that participated this year?” finished Chiron.

…

Dumbledore seemed to like the idea. 

Percy didn’t know what to think of it.

On one hand, sure, he was curious about the new magical world and, sure, he could spend more time with Harry and know him better and all that, which was good, because he hadn’t had any (decent) family members outside his own parents. 

_ On the other hand _ , that meant that he would be gone for quite a few months. Away from his parents. Away from the people who had thought that they’d lost him just a month before. Again. He didn’t know if he liked that so much. Not to mention that he had wanted a normal year for once. A year to deal with all the bullshit he’d been through for such a long year. A year to  _ heal,  _ to spend time with Annabeth, to- but  _ no _ , he had to go on another mission, because this wasn’t even a quest, this was a full-on  _ mission. _

“It’ll be okay,” had said his mother that night, when he had entered the apartment with a slam of the door before slumping on the sofa with a groan. “This is nothing like the last time. It’ll be fine.”

“I’m still gonna leave you for a long time,” had said Percy, with his face pressed against a cushion while he’d been trying to keep his tears of frustration from leaking out of his closed eyes. The fact that his mother had been running her hands through his hair hadn’t helped. “ _ Again. _ I don’t- I just wanted a normal year, was that too much to ask?”

The blue pie that they ate after dinner did help to improve his mood. Somewhat. 

Annabeth had left the city to visit her parents again and probably tell them of what had happened and that she would be gone for a while. That only made Percy sulk harder about the situation, but she still called him a few times a day to talk and probably to try and cheer him up.

“We’ll study together,” she said with a wide smile that managed to get Percy to smile slightly. That only made hers widen further. “We’ll study our notes together and in person, not through Iris Messages like other times.”

“I’m a bad study partner, just so you know,” warned Percy with a soft snort. Gods, he couldn’t stay in a bad mood when she was talking with him. “Like, I’ll borrow your notes and I’ll only end up messing them up.”

“You make it sound like I’m any better,” retorted Annabeth and she nodded to her back, at her room. “Have you seen my desk? My bed? My entire room? You’re not special, Seaweed Brain.”

“That hurts my ego, Wise Girl,” he moaned, slapping one hand on his chest as if he had been wounded, but his smile had widened and his eyes had crinkled because of his grin. “I thought I was the top one messy student.”

“I’m sorry, but you’re not,” said Annabeth and she stuck her tongue at him like the child she could be. Then she smirked. “And aren’t you curious? Who knew that wizards existed?”

“Well, the same could be said for us,” shrugged Percy. Honestly, every time he saw something weird in his life he just tended to take in stride. Nothing could surprise him anymore. Except the moving photographs. That was still  _ so cool. _

“Yes! But now we can see them in action and learn more about them and-” she rambled and then she gasped. Percy arched an eyebrow at her and her wide eyes. “Dumbledore said that Hogwarts was an ancient castle. I wonder what kind of-”

It was pretty late by then, and still, Percy stayed awake for the next half an hour, listening as Annabeth threw theories to the wind about what kind of castle it was and what kind of arches it could have and the windows and the mentioned bridge and- 

It took him some time, but he ended up feeling curious about the wizards as well. 

Dumbledore sent them some more information about the wizarding world so they wouldn’t be found out in less than five minutes when they talked with the wizards. That meant learning about apparition, some of the subjects that were usually taught at school,  _ animagus _ and Quidditch and more. Harry had said that he played Quidditch, right? Percy thought that it was an interesting sport, sure, but he was quite convinced that he wouldn’t try it out, not even if someone tied him up to a broom and launched him into the sky with a “good luck”. No. There was no way. He’d already survived two flights, he wasn’t about to test his luck with  _ brooms. _

At least his parents, Annabeth and a few more of his friends thought that his determination  _ not  _ to be caught  _ on a broom _ was both admirable and hilarious.

...

The scale of this so-called mission was too big to keep under wraps for too long so, even if Piper had somehow managed to stop the Stoll brothers from knowing about it while Dumbledore was present, they still told the rest of the camp at one of the bonfires, which resulted in, surprise surprise,  _ mass panic _ and manic laughter. Chiron managed to calm everyone down, but that had been one of the most tense bonfires they’d ever had. 

So, at the end of September, there they all were around the battered ping-pong table. It wasn’t quite a war council, but it was close, especially because they had visitors from Camp Jupiter, meaning: Reyna, Hazel, Frank and - technically - Jason, as he was still one of the  _ praetors _ , even if he usually just acted as some kind of discount Hermes most of the time between the camps.

“Chiron, are you  _ sure _ that this isn’t going to escalate into a full-on war and that we aren’t getting into something we shouldn’t?” asked Reyna, for what felt like the hundredth time that week. Chiron seemed to think the same, because he let out a long-suffering sigh. 

“I’m not  _ sure _ about anything right now, Reyna,” he said, voice tired and Percy frowned at the dark circles under his eyes. “The only thing we can do is to get involved to avoid a worse outcome.” Reyna wasn’t too hopeful, if Percy had to guess from the way she pressed her lips into a thin line. “In any case, this isn’t what we’re here for.”

“Right, we’re deciding who are the pigs sent to slaughter, right?” said Leo from where he was tilting his chair back to see how long he could go without falling hard on his back and probably crack his head open. 

“Leo,” hissed Piper, and she tried to elbow him on the side, but Leo twisted and almost fell on the floor, before he regained his balance with a grin. 

“We’re here to decide who goes on this… mission,” said Chiron, with a small nod. 

Percy hid a sigh, resigned and then just said ‘fuck it’ in his head, before standing up from his seat and raising his hand in a half-hearted wave.

“I’ll go,” he said and maybe he should have put more emotion in there, but it wasn’t his fault that he was feeling a bit dead inside that day. Every day. Whatever. “Harry’s my cousin, after all.”

“I’m going too,” jumped Annabeth, standing next to him. Percy sent her a small smile. Warmth spread through his whole body when she smiled back with a glint in her grey eyes. “You need some smarts for this, Seaweed Brain.” 

The ‘we’re staying together’ was silent, but it also echoed in the now quiet room, it reflected in Annabeth’s eyes as she met his gaze, unwavering, as sharp as her sword. Percy’s smile widened.

“Me too,” came Nico’s voice from one of the corners. He had his arms crossed and he seemed a bit apart from the group, but Will was still by his side, much closer than anyone else. “That guy is supposed to rise from the death. That’s my area of expertise.” 

“Then, that means I’m going too,” nodded Hazel, sending a small smile to her half-brother. Frank twitched by her side, but the next one to talk was Will.

“I’m coming with,” he said. Nico looked away. Everyone kept quiet about the twitch of his lips. “Who knows what you’ll deal with. I’m not necessarily the best healer, but I can manage.”

“Don’t get too ahead of yourselves,” advised Reyna, arms still crossed on her chest. Her dogs were resting at her feet, but Percy could still see their metal eyes looking around. “There’s a higher risk of being found out if they go too many.”

“That’s true, however…” mumbled Chiron, shuffling on his feet- or more like, hooves. “We’re supposed to be a school. If it’s only five of us, it’d be suspicious. Mr Dumbledore said that the other schools would be represented for quite a few students.”

“And it’s not like we wouldn’t have space for us ‘students’, am I right?” chirped Leo, with a wide grin. He waved a hand in the air. “After all, you’re traveling with the new Argo, right? You’ll need a mechanic. In other words,  _ me. _ I’m coming with. You’re not getting away from me, sorry to say.” Then he paused. “We need to have a grandiose entrance, right?”

“Wizards seem to be quite, uh…  _ over-the-top _ , for what we’ve been told,” coughed Jason, but he couldn’t hide his amused smile. Leo’s grin was back. 

“Then we need you, Jason, our very own lightning factory,” proclaimed Leo, waving his hands in the air like some kind of conductor. “With you and Percy over there, our entrance would be  _ totally amazing _ , can you  _ imagine _ -?”

Percy didn’t know how on board he was with organizing some kind of water-show, much less coordinating with Jason’s lightning and air powers, that could go wrong  _ so quickly _ and it wasn’t really worth it for, what? Make a few wizards open their jaws in awe? That was- okay, so, he maybe, kinda, wanted to see that? 

“Someone should be there to do damage control,” said Piper, with a rueful smile. “I mean, Hazel can control the Mist, but we don’t know if it affects the wizards and to what extent, so…”

“So, basically the Seven plus Nico and Will, uh?” commented Lou Ellen with an amused smile. When Percy turned to her, he couldn’t help but feel as if her smile looked more… sad? “It’s you nine again…”

“We don’t mind, Lou,” reassured Piper, with a small smile. That wasn’t charmspeak. 

And Lou Ellen knew that, because she sighed slowly, before she tried for a smile again. This time, it was more of a success. 

“Okay, just- okay,” she stammered. Piper squeezed her shoulder. “Please, be careful.”

“We will,” mumbled Piper. 

There was a beat of silence while they all lost themselves in their thoughts and tried to dig hope from somewhere in their minds. Gods knew Percy was doing that enough. 

“So…” came Travis’ voice. “Will you…”

“...bring us more souvenirs?” finished Connor. 

“It’s just- business, y’know?” continued Travis. Their smiles were the definition of ‘trouble you don’t want to even think about, unless you want an aneurism’. 

Everyone was quiet for another second, before they all snorted and laughed. 

…

“Please, tell me we won’t have to travel by sea too much,” groaned Hazel that very same night, after the bonfire had ended and the youngest campers had gone away to their cabins herded by the older campers. 

By that time, they were mostly alone. There were a few campers loitering around, talking in hushed tones and some of them, probably a few sons of Hypnos, were already sleeping on the ground like oversized rocks. Percy figured someone should have to bring them back to their cabins and actual beds if they didn’t want to deal with the harpies. 

“I guess we can do more or less the same as… last time,” said Annabeth. Nobody mentioned her backtracking there, and nobody mentioned how she avoided saying any name. Names have power. In more ways than one. 

Hazel tried to hide her sigh, but Percy didn’t know how successful she’d been. Frank patted her arm with a rueful smile and Hazel rubbed her face. 

Nico and Will were walking around the beach side by side, talking among themselves, apparently calm and unbothered, but sometimes Nico’s shoulders went up and sometimes Will reached out with a tense hand. They were all on edge. The worst thing was that it wasn’t even anyone’s fault. Percy couldn’t, for the life of him, fault Harry. His cousin had only asked him a few questions, he had reached out to him in an act of hope and trust. Helping him was the least Percy could do, and yet… and yet, ever since they learned about it, there was a bitter taste in his mouth that refused to go away, no matter what his closest people told him. After all these years, he was just… tired. 

“When do we need to arrive at, uh… what was the school’s name? Hogwash? Hoe-wash?” asked Leo, looking towards his and Calypsos’ shed. 

Percy had wondered if Calypso would go with them, but when he’d asked, Chiron had said that it would be better to bring only demigods. It could be dangerous, as they didn’t know what they would find there, and one of the ideas they’ve had to cover for their magic-less powers was that each of them specialized in different kinds of ancient magic. Percy had wondered what Annabeth’s type of magic would be, then. Analytics? Super-intelligence? He doubted there was any magic type like that. 

“Hogwarts,” corrected Piper, with a resigned glance at Leo. The other boy grinned, but his eyes were heavy and Percy was quite sure that it wasn’t because the lack of sleep he was probably suffering from. 

“So? How many times will we almost die there? Any bets?” asked Leo and all of them groaned. Piper herself let herself fall back on the sand, glaring up at the stars.

“With our luck? Probably  _ a lot  _ of times,” she grumbled. Leo shook a finger at her.

“That’s not an answer, Pipes,” he pointed out. Piper glared at him. Leo’s grin turned rueful. “Hey, I’m trying here. We’re all acting like zombies sent to slaughter.”

“Who says that’s not what we’re doing?” mumbled Percy, mostly to himself, but Annabeth seemed to heard him, because she pressed against him and clenched his hand between both of hers. 

“Okay,  _ that’s _ depressing,” replied Leo and, okay, had everyone heard him? 

“I still want to help my cousin, though,” he added quickly, after a sigh. Annabeth perked up.

“Maybe you should send him a letter,” she said, and when she turned to look up at him, her eyes were bright with a promise of amusement and her lips were twitching up. “You know, give some kind of clue about our plan, but not saying it outright.”

Percy mulled it over as his friends looked at both of them with curious and confused eyes. Harry and him had only known each other for a few days, but even then Percy knew that they were quite close already, if only because their sense of humor was pretty similar and that helped a ton when their lives were, to put it plainly, shit, if he had to guess from what they had managed to gleam from the wizarding newspapers. 

Slowly, a lopsided grin appeared on his face. Annabeth’s eyes crinkled. 

“Do I want to know?” asked Jason, shoulders tense but eyes resigned. 

“Probably not,” said Annabeth, simply. Jason closed his mouth and then sighed, muttering about ‘stupid worlds that didn’t make sense’. Honestly, Percy could relate. Then Annabeth hummed. “Do you think we should get our own owl?”

“So it can glare at me everywhere we go? No thanks,” grumbled Percy, remembering Hedwig’s cold eyes as she perched on his windowsill. He could swear he could  _ feel _ her murdering aura and he couldn’t for the life of him figure out if it was another being-a-son-of-Poseidon kind of perk or if it was just because he had almost thrown the stupid bird out two windows. 

“I can probably make a mechanical one,” mused Leo, before a huge yawn split his mouth open before he could say anything else. He shook his head and stood up. “Well, dear friends, I still have work to do and a few coffees to drink, so if you’ll excuse me…”

With that and a bow, Leo walked off in search of coffee. 

The remaining of them all traded glances. 

They quickly stood up to go to their cabins and pretend to sleep.

The world still wasn’t ready to deal with a caffeinated demigod, much less a caffeinated  _ Leo. _ Retreat was the only option.

…

Percy did end up sending a short letter to Harry, asking him if he was okay, if he was having fun at school and if he had any funny stuff to share with the class. He also wrote some pretty vague hints about a reunion between them that was closer than he thought, with some pretty ominous turns of phrase that he had learnt from years of running from and fighting against evil mythical monsters that wanted to kill him or eat him or- whatever. Even through writing, Harry’s response was clearly confused and maybe a bit worried, as he talked about his friends and the Triwizard Tournament and the fact that Quidditch had been canceled that year. Harry made it sound like it was the end of the world, but Percy was quite sure that it wasn’t that serious, seeing as he had been there, done that. 

Before they knew it, the Argo III was finished and inaugurated thanks to a proud Leo and Calypso, all the preparations between Dumbledore and Chiron were ready, the gods were radio-silent, which was  _ perfect, thank you,  _ and it was the end of October. Which meant they had to set off and cross the ocean  _ again _ to reach Europe  _ again _ on time.  _ Again. _

At least this time they wouldn’t need to deal with Coach Hedge, which was both good and bad, because, yes, he could be a  _ pain _ but, you know, he wasn’t  _ that bad. _ They were traveling with Chiron, though, so it was nice and good and  _ so fucking reassuring. _ Chiron didn’t (usually) go out in “quests” with demigods, but seeing as this wasn’t exactly a quest, it wasn’t that far-fetched. Maybe. Most times, if Chiron entered the battleground, it was only because things were going really bad really fast. Percy knew better than to hope everything to go smoothly, but hey-

“Please, be careful,” mumbled his mom, just before Argus took them back to camp so they could leave on the Argo III. She hugged him as if it was the last time she would see him, which Percy was avoiding  _ thinking about _ thank you very much.

“I will,” he mumbled back, face pressed against her hair. Her hands tightened on his back and Percy fought to shove his tears back. “I expect you to tell me when little Estelle is born, okay?”

“Don’t worry, you’ll be the first to know,” said Paul, next to them. 

Percy had never been too good at goodbyes, if only because he always had that nagging feeling at the back of his mind that screamed at him that maybe, just maybe, this was the time where his luck would run out and- 

But he forced himself to step back from their embraces, take his bag and walk down the street towards Argus’ van, clenching Annabeth’s hand in his like some kind of lighthouse that would lead him home. 

A school full of wizards from different countries. If only, this year would be  _ interesting _ .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter we finally get to the Hogwarts stuff! Yay!


	9. My cousin surfes on the lake with a flying ship

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Merry (late) Christmas and (pls for the love of everything) Happy New Year!   
> (Also, because I saw a few comments talking about it... Yeah, everyone other than Harry, Annabeth and Percy (and probably Hermione too honestly) will be background characters. I want to focus on their relationship and, well. Guys. Guys, I'm not suicidal. If that's not your cup of tea, well, there you go. *And another thing* Is this story cliché? Probably, but I'm too tired to give a damn, honestly.)

If there was one thing that Harry liked about Hogwarts, it was that the school years were usually quite interesting. 

Sure, most of the “interesting part” was mostly people trying to kill him or hurt him or trying to get something out of him, but hey, at least he wasn’t bored and he didn’t spend his days living under piles of homework. 

Who was he kidding, he just wanted  _ one normal year _ , was that too much to ask?

This year there was no quidditch.  _ No quidditch. _ What the bloody-? But there was this other thing, the Triwizard Tournament, and okay, it did look interesting and fun. Traditionally, there were three schools participating in those tasks - Hogwarts, Durmstrang and Beauxbatons. And here’s the kicker: this year, there would be  _ another _ school. Which made them four. Triwizard Tournament indeed, as they had joked just after the announcement. 

In any case, Harry found himself excited about it. Sure, he couldn’t participate himself - which was actually a  _ win _ in his books because, hey, he could  _ watch  _ shit going down this time instead of being in the middle of it - and sure, he didn’t have quidditch, but there were other schools coming to Hogwarts.

He knew, realistically, that Hogwarts and Britain weren’t the only places where there were wizards; his cousin Percy and Annabeth had helped put things in perspective, as they came from the United States. His head had doubted it, though. Not because he doubted his family members that lived on the other side of the ocean, no, as much as Hermione liked to say that there was something they were missing about the whole situation. It was just…  _ more wizards. _ More cultures, maybe new things to see. 

And then he remembered that Malfoy’s father had wanted to send his ferret of a son to one of the schools that would visit them and his face did this weird thing where it couldn’t decide if it wanted to look constipated or disgusted.

And  _ then _ Ron had said that Viktor Krum was from that very same school and Harry found himself the unwilling victim of an analysis about how good of a quidditch player he was for the next hour and a half, before he managed to escape to their next lesson, which was, horribly enough, History of Magic.

After that, it was no wonder that Harry ended up looking at Hermione’s calendar with mixed feelings rolling around his stomach. 

He wondered, not for the first time, what would go wrong that year and how it would find him and asked Hagrid if he could hide in the Forbidden Forest for the rest of the year to avoid an international conflict. 

Hagrid laughed at him, slammed his huge hand on his back and then skipped off to feed some kind of magical creature that could probably eat them whole in less than a second. 

Harry didn’t have the heart to tell him that he had been serious. 

…

It was already the start of October, which meant that the schools would arrive at Hogwarts in less than a month, which meant that if Harry didn’t make his mind up about the whole situation, he would have to deal with it for the rest of the year. Not fun. Because he still had this weird mix of ‘excitement’ and ‘dread’ battling in his mind in the middle of class and if Snape yelled at him  _ one more time _ , Harry wouldn’t be able to hold himself back from doing the same and _ nobody _ wanted that. Except Malfoy, but Malfoy was like a weed that kept growing in your garden over and over again and made you wish you could set it on fire. 

It honestly didn’t help that his cousin Percy sent him a letter that could only be described as  _ ominous _ . 

_...I swear, I’ve never seen an old lady run that fast. She just caught up with the guy, kicked him behind the knee and grabbed her purse, cursing at him and yelling. It was absolutely awesome, wish you’d seen it.  _

_ Oh, yeah, how do you feel about a visit? Mom and Paul probably won’t go, they’re dealing with work and what not- and now Estelle too. There’s so much to prepare before she’s born, did you know that? I didn’t. Makes me wonder how my mum could have dealt with it when she was pregnant with me.  _

_ Anyway, it would be Annabeth and I. Probably a few of our friends too. They loved the souvenirs so much, they decided to visit themselves, it seems.  _

_ Oh, yeah, that Triwizard Tournament sounds cool. Not so ‘tri’ anymore, though.  _

And that was it.  _ That was it. _

_ What the hell, Percy? _

Harry was starting to wonder if Percy wasn’t actually more like the Weasley twins than his group of friends. Maybe he had made a mistake. In any case, when he showed the letter to Hermione to make her maybe calm down a bit about his family - because honestly, obsessing over school, Harry’s family  _ and _ the elves couldn’t be healthy - she couldn’t make sense of it either. Then again, maybe it was that Percy’s handwriting was atrocious, full of blurs and careless scratches of ink. It was written by pen, though. If only  _ they _ could write by pen too…

“Your cousin attended a school in the States, right?” asked Fred from where he was peeking at the letter above Harry’s shoulder. 

“Yes, he does,” nodded Harry, resigned. He knew better than anyone not to expect a pinch of privacy in this school. “I don’t know how it’s called, though.”

“Tough luck,” mumbled George from his side. Harry turned to him with a confused frown. 

“What?” he asked, because  _ what _ ?

“Nothin’,” was George’s only response, which was s _ uspicious _ as  _ hell _ , especially coming from Weasley twin number, uh… number. “C’mon, Fred, we still have work to do.”

And with that, both twins disappeared down the hallway. Muttering to each other. Harry was 100% sure that ‘work’ wasn’t ‘homework’. At least, not school homework. Only, personal homework. 

“Let’s not go close to them for a while,” mumbled Ron around his breakfast. Harry nodded absentmindedly. 

“Good idea,” he mumbled back. 

…

It was cold, it was humid, it was awkward and it was annoying. All in all, not his favourite plan to spend a October afternoon. 

But damn, if it wasn’t worth it.

Beauxbatons arrived on a flying carriage pulled by a dozen winged horses that Harry was sure had made Hagrid probably burst a blood vessel from excitement. Harry was quite chagrined when he couldn’t see them too well, due to the wall of students in front of him that blocked the Beauxbatons delegation. Frowning, he pushed against the older students in front of him, who gave him a cold glare before turning their attention to the muffled conversation between Madame Maxime and Professor Dumbledore. Hermione rolled her eyes next to him and Harry sent her an afronted look; hey, he was sure that Hermione was dying to see them too. 

Durmstrang came on a huge galleon that reminded Harry a bit of skeleton, but instead of just sailing there like any other ship, the galleon broke through the Black Lake’s surface. Harry wondered if they had been inspired by a submarine, and then hit a blank when he remembered that wizards didn’t want anything to do with muggles. 

Harry tried to keep Ron from fainting when they finally managed to see Viktor Krum in the distance, as they were now closer to the water, and this time it was the older students pushing at him so they could watch. Harry was still slightly shorter than them, though - they didn’t have the right to complain. At all. Hermione rolled her eyes again and mumbled something about being childish. 

“There’s only the new school left, isn’t it, George?” came the Weasley twins’ voices from behind them. Harry almost flinched away from whatever prank they were planning, because their voices were  _ amused.  _ That was  _ never _ good.

“Yes, only them, Fred.” 

Oh, they were so screwed. Good thing the other two schools had already entered the castle. Or, well, most of them, because if Harry had to guess from the movement in the back, some of the Durmstrang students had decided to hang around and watch the show. The cold autumn wind didn’t seem to bother them much, anyway. Then again, with the tons of heavy coats they were wearing, Harry would worry if it did. He’d heard of the cold north, but  _ wow _ .

“Hey! See that?”

“What  _ is _ that?”

“Another flying carriage? Pf, talk about  _ overused. _ ”

“It looks a lot bigger, though.”

“Wait… is that a  _ flying ship _ ?”

Harry almost choked at that and lifted his head. 

There, cutting through the dense clouds that promised rain any minute, a shadow of something bigger than a carriage pulled by winged horses… 

A flying ship. 

A flying ship that was falling down straight towards the lake at a blinding speed-

_ Oh no _ .

The ship slammed against the water with so much force that it raised a wave taller than the other ship. Good thing that there wasn’t anyone left in there or, well, at least Harry hoped so, because the wave was heading straight to it like some kind of miniature tsunami that would completely  _ sink- _

The wave didn’t even touch the other ship. 

It just- it looked like a natural movement, as if the wave hadn’t meant to go there to start with, but there was  _ no way _ , was there?

Harry finally managed peel his eyes away from the untouched ship and focus on the newly arrived one, taking note of the familiar shape, the intricate dragon head that took his breath away, the colorful flag fluttering in the autumn wind. It was only because of his recent trip to the British Museum that he recognized the ship as a Greek trireme. It was slightly smaller than the neighbouring galleon, but no less grand. 

They all watched with bated breath as the person who had been nearly sitting on the dragon figurehead finally climbed down to join the small multitude of other people on deck - the students, probably.

“Our most warm welcome to Apsída, Academy of Ancient Magic and Mythology,” came Professor Dumbledore’s booming voice from somewhere behind them. “They came a long way from the United States of America.”

_...Wait a minute.  _

All the students watched as the group of students climbed over to the castle from the lake, talking among themselves and commenting on the extreme and forceful arrival that didn’t have anything in common with the other two schools. Where Beauxbatons had been elegant, where Durmstrang had been controlled and stoic, Apsída had been like a bomb, a slap in the face that talked about power and endurance. That, or the students and teachers at that school were crazy and just liked the rush of adrenaline, which was a terrifying concept, especially seeing as they would participate in a dangerous tournament. 

The whispers raised in volume as the minutes ticked on and the foreigner students came closer, led by a middle-aged man on a wheelchair. It was when Harry caught sight of familiar blond curls, that he sucked in a breath that almost made him cough, before bolting through the mass of students so he could get to the front just in time to see the two headmasters shake hands. 

But Harry, for once in his life, completely ignored the adults and focused on the students. There were at least two students that  _ he knew, personally. _

Annabeth, with the same golden curls thrown carelessly over her shoulder and sharp grey eyes analysing the castle with shining interest as she stood behind the headmaster of her school like some kind of bodyguard. Percy, with the same windblown black hair and clear sea-green eyes that looked around with amusement as the students from Hogwarts gapped at them, fidgeting hands stuffed in his pockets. 

Harry managed to get their attention when he finally shoved the last few students from his path, ignoring their complains and yelling so he could stand in front of them all like some kind of idiot. 

Percy grinned at him, that absolute  _ asshole _ .

“Hey, cousin. Been a while, hasn’t it?” 

…

Harry ignored the curious eyes of his classmates and some of the other schools’ students and managed to grab Percy’s arm in a vice-like grip so the pain in the arse wouldn’t be able to run away from him and  _ explained what the hell was going on. _ Percy didn’t even seem like he minded much, because he only sent an amused glance at his supposed classmates, before letting himself be dragged to the Great Hall and sat side by side with Harry. 

Resisting the impulse to just slam his head against the table a few times until the world made sense, Harry allowed himself to massage his temples and wish his headache and shock away. Percy looked around with interested and curious eyes, for what Harry could see. At least  _ someone _ was having fun here.

“Is that the actual sky?” asked Percy, pointing up to the ceiling with wide eyes. Harry growled under his breath.

“The ceiling is enchanted so it shows the sky in real-time, so yes, it’s the actual sky,  _ but that’s not what I _ -” Harry cut himself off and cursed under his breath, before giving up and letting his head fall on the table. He heard Percy stifle a snicker behind his hand and Harry didn’t even feel sorry about the kick he gave him in retaliation. He  _ deserved it. _ “I hate you, you know that?”

“It took you longer to tell me that than other people I know,” said Percy, in a mix between dry and rueful. Harry didn’t let himself dwell on that and groaned against the table.

People started filling in and sitting down around them. There was still no sign of Annabeth, but Harry saw a few of Percy’s classmates talking among themselves while pointing at the different tables with amused expressions, before laughing and obviously choosing their table at random. They sat on the Ravenclaw table, close to Cho Chang, so Harry averted his eyes.

_ Focus, Potter. _

Maybe the Malfoy-tone he had used was the reason why he managed to get back on track, which was horrifying. 

“Why didn’t you tell me straight up?” he asked, and yes, maybe he sounded like a little kid, but he was quite sure that he had the right, seeing as he’d nearly have a heart attack. 

Okay, maybe nothing as drastic as that, but whatever.

“We thought it would be funny,” shrugged Percy, with his usual lopsided smile that always neared a smirk more than anything else. “You should have seen your face. 10/10.”

“‘We’?” repeated Harry, and then slammed his forehead on the table again. “Annabeth was in on it too, wasn’t she?”

“I was actually the one who came up with the idea,” came Annabeth’s voice from behind him, full of amusement. Harry groaned again and Annabeth chuckled, before sitting down next to Percy. 

Harry felt his friends and other close classmates sit close to him, most probably so they could listen in on their conversation and maybe give the rumor mill some more news about him to spread around. He could almost see Hermione stare a hole into them from the seat in front of them. 

“This doesn’t have anything to do with what I told you back then, does it?” he said, completely resigned. There was no way that Percy and Annabeth were here just for a family reunion, as much as he’d like that. The silence was answer enough. He sighed. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry,” reassured Annabeth, voice softer and calm as the eye of a storm. “We prefer knowing of any kind of danger, instead of being ignorant of it...”

“...Until it’s staring at us right in the face, about to eat us,” finished Percy. His grin was rueful. 

Harry frowned, but then Professor Dumbledore gave a short speech, before they could start eating. The food appeared out of thin air and the students jumped right into it, talking with each other and sometimes yelling at each other with jokes and laughs. Only the Beauxbatons seemed a bit out of place, compared to the Durmstrang students that seemed nearly as boisterous as the Hogwarts students when it came to socialising and the students from Apsída, who had started a conversation with the Ravenclaws that seemed to be led by a Latin boy and another two older Ravenclaws that gestured a lot in the air. 

“You don’t seem too surprised about the food appearing out of nowhere,” said Hermione, after Ron left the table to make a fool of himself in front of a few Beauxbatons students. Annabeth met Hermione’s arched eyebrow and suspicious gaze with her sharp eyes and a shrug. Harry hid a sigh. 

“We have something similar back at home,” she answered, simply. Percy snickered next to her. 

“And with our lives, well… weird is the new normal, right?” he said, before rising a glass of blue… something, as if he was toasting. Annabeth joined him with a small grin and both of them drank. 

Fortunately, Hermione left them alone after that. It wasn’t for lack of material, Harry could admit begrudgingly, because at some point, the students of Apsída managed to knock on the table not one, but  _ two  _ candles that burned part of their meals, with the weirdest thing being that they didn’t seem to care one bit and just  _ left the fire right there _ in the middle of the table like some kind of pyre, joking all the while about how it reminded them about the campfire they made all the nights they stayed at “camp” and how their parents would be happy, _for some reason_. 

Harry wondered shortly if they were feeling okay after falling who-knew-how-many feet from the sky on a flying ship after probably  _ days _ of travel. He decided not to ask and watch as the four headmasters explained the rules of the Triwizard Tournament. Professor Dumbledore, Madam Maxime, Karkaroff and Chiron all put emphasis on the “being older than 17” rule, which spoke a lot about their schools and the wizarding world in general. 

It was at that phrase that Harry noticed Percy and Annabeth meet their eyes with something close to dread, shoulders tense and hands hidden under the table. For a moment, Harry wondered how old they both were and if they would participate. He would definitely cheer for them, of course, so why did they look as if one of them was going to fall off a cliff at any given moment?

As he watched Percy and Annabeth turn back out towards their  _ flying ship _ , still quiet and weirdly tense, Harry sighed and decided to deal with that the next day.

Ron patted his shoulder and gave him a rueful smile.

“Well? Didn’t you want to spend more time with your family?” he said.

Harry was tempted to throw himself off the Hogwarts bridge, but in the end, he just plopped down in bed and passed out. 

This was a problem for future-him to handle, not present-him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apsída: Arcane in Greek. Hopefully.


	10. The magical cup of arson

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *barrels through the door and gulps an entire cup of coffee like a shot* University finals sucks more than usual, but at least I passed all my classes, so here you go, a chapter that's slightly late, i'm gonna go lay down for a few days *finger guns*

“Did you see their faces? Priceless!” 

Leo plopped down on one of the chairs around the long table so similar to the one they’d had in the other Argo. Leo had based most of his new designs on the old one, of course, but still, it wasn’t the same. There were little details that jumped at their eyes that reminded them that they weren’t on the same boat that sailed them to one of the worst (if not  _ the worst _ ) battle of their lives. The windows weren’t the same shape, the rooms were arranged differently, the table was darker than the old one, there were cravings on the sides that the old trireme didn’t have, the hallways had some of the paintings that the youngest campers had painted for them just before they set off. 

“It’s still really weird, though,” mussed Piper, sitting down on one of the chairs and leaning on the table with thoughtful eyes. “Like, I’m pretty sure that we’ve all seen places more… grandiose than this castle. I don’t feel like I’m in a different “world”, so to speak, you know?”

“It’s surprisingly… normal, yes,” nodded Annabeth. 

“We haven’t really seen much of it yet, though,” pointed out Frank, leaning on the wall and looking out the door. Poor Hazel was still wandering the deck with Nico and Will, getting used to the water again and trying not to, uh, yeah, puke all the amazing food they’d just had. 

“That’s true,” nodded Jason. Then he smiled. “Who wants to explore the castle tomorrow?”

“Oh, oh, me!” waved Leo, eyes shining with interest that all of them knew could turn from ‘amusing’ to ‘horrifically dangerous’ in like, two seconds. “I wanna see what kind of artifacts they have-”

“They don’t really have anything technological here, Leo, remember,” said Annabeth, arching an eyebrow. Leo grinned at her.

“That doesn’t mean that they have  _ nothing _ ,” he said and that was that, because honestly? Sure, Dumbledore had told them the basics of the world, but he had also said that there were some magical artifacts and dark objects and- Hey, wait, he kinda remembered…

“Annabeth, those two red-heads, the twins… how were they called?” he asked. He hadn’t talked to them much at dinner, but he had noticed how their eyes did have that same shine as the Stoll brothers and, who better than them to get Leo in a controlled dangerous environment to go nuts?

“Ah, I think Fred and George?” replied Annabeth, tapping her fingers on the table. “They are Harry’s friend’s brothers.”

“No kidding,” he muttered, thinking of at least another red-head sitting at the table who looked from the same family. Same red hair, same freckles, same eyes. It was just too obvious. 

“You know of a few interesting and helpful partners in crime for me?” asked Leo, with arched eyebrows and wide grin. Before Percy could regret it, he nodded.

“Yeah, you can probably ally with them and get them to tell you the secrets of the wizarding world or something like that, without, you know, dying because you have no idea what you’re doing,” he said in the end. Leo huffed.

“Hey, I always know what I’m doing,” he said. They all stared at him, silent and with pointed looks. Leo grimaced. “Mostly.”

It was then that the door opened and Hazel finally entered, looking still a bit queasy but at least not as if she would puke at any moment in the middle of the room. Nico followed after her, with some amusement in his dark eyes and Will by his side like some kind of sun. 

"It's fine, Will," was saying Hazel, shaking her head. Will opened his mouth to talk, but Hazel continued. "Look, as long as the stupid boat is still, I'll manage."

And so, she plopped down in one of the seats with a long-suffering sigh. Frank immediately came closer to her and sat next to her like some kind of guardian dog- that was a funny image, not gonna lie. Will, for his part, just shrugged slightly and moved to the table as well, followed by Nico, who was as much of a shadow as always. 

"So? What's the plan for tomorrow?" asked Will, arching an eyebrow. 

"Mostly, try not to blow anything up," said Jason. They all looked at Leo again. 

"Oh, c'mon! I can behave!" he said, throwing his hands in the air. Piper arched an eyebrow at him. Leo huffed. "The trust you have in me is astounding." 

"Also, try not to make the wizards suspicious of us," added Annabeth. Percy knew her well enough to distinguish the doubts in her voice.

Honestly, if they weren't found out in the first month, it would be a miracle. Not a miracle by the gods, because honestly? If the gods would just turn a blind eye to them for  _ once in their lives _ , that would be  _ wonderful _ . If only for their sanity. Percy was quite sure that if Mister D appeared in front of them at some point, he would  _ flip _ . 

"Difficult," muttered Nico. Percy looked at him. Ah, a man after his own heart. He'd never had guessed that he would say that about  _ Nico _ of all people. 

"Well, at least  _ try _ ," sighed Annabeth. 

The door opened again that night, this time to let Chiron in with his wheelchair. Leo had taken care to include ramps and easy access to all rooms and areas of the chip, so Chiron had enough freedom to burst into their rooms in the middle of the night riding his wheelchair. Not that he would, but he still could if he wanted to. 

“That went well, I’d say,” was the first thing he said, and it was honestly such an amazingly  _ optimistic _ thing to say, Percy was starting to worry about his expectations if not blowing anything up and not being in constant danger of death was  _ optimistic. _

“We still have to talk about the tournament, though,” said Annabeth through clenched teeth, getting everyone back on track. The change was immediate. All the good mood dissipated in the air like some kind of illusion. 

“That’s right,” nodded Chiron, voice heavy again, but not as heavy as other times, for which Percy was glad. So glad. 

And there was silence. 

“No surprise there,” sighed Will from where he had been rubbing his face with his hands. He lifted his head with a rueful smile. “I’m sorry, but most of us can't be our “school’s” champion. We’re not seventeen. That just leaves… ”

Of course.

Of  _ fucking _ course.

“There’s only two of us over the age of seventeen,” said Chiron, and his voice was heavy and resigned and maybe even sad and-

And Percy looked over at Annabeth, just in time to catch her eyes for a second, before she pressed her lips in a thin line and she stood up from her seat with clenched fists and focused her sharp eyes on Chiron like an arrow-

Percy was faster.

“I’ll do it,” the words came out of his mouth in a way that left him still slightly detached from reality, as if he hadn’t been the one saying them. 

“Percy-” Annabeth was glaring at him, eyes angry but  _ terrified _ , her hands were shaking by her sides. 

“Don’t ‘Percy’ me, I’m not letting you deal with all that, after everything that’s happened this summer,” he said, and he actually said it, he didn’t yell like he had expected to when he’d opened his mouth to cut Annabeth off before she could throw some good reasons at his face about how she was the better choice for this. 

“I can handle myself,” bit out Annabeth, but her anger was turning more and more into actual  _ worry _ and  _ fear. _

Percy could probably guess why. Annabeth always worked with possibilities. It was what she  _ did. _ To make the best plans, she had to consider all the possible outcomes. Even the bad ones. This time, Percy had to fight alone. It wasn’t the first time, of course. But they were a  _ team. _ And after what happened, it didn’t take a genius to see that Annabeth was focusing more on everything that could go  _ wrong _ this time. Percy understood. He  _ got it _ , and yet-

“I know that better than anyone else,” he said and this time, he got up to put his hands on Annabeth’s shoulders. Like this, he could feel the tiny tremors running through her body, the tension on her shoulders, as if she was expecting some _ thing _ to jump at them and kill them at any moment. “I can’t count how many times you’ve saved my life. And that’s why, Annabeth, let me do this.” He looked into her eyes, her brilliant grey eyes like a storm, and tried to grin. “I’ll be the brawls this time. You be the amazing brains and get to the bottom of this while I kick ass.”

The room was in total silence and Percy could feel the stares of his friends on his back, but he only continued to look Annabeth in the eye as she searched his gaze for any lies, anything that could change his mind. 

Until, a few seconds later, when she gave a long sigh that washed away most of the tension from her shoulders and she threw her trembling arms around him, tight, so tight it hurt, but Percy just did the same and allowed himself to hide his probably resigned face in her hair for a few seconds, before he had to face the others and confirm that, yes, he would be the school’s champion. 

And honestly, maybe it wouldn’t even be  _ that _ bad. Better him than another of their friends. 

As if reading his mind, Annabeth tightened her grip.

“I hate your stupid fatal flaw,” she mumbled. Percy hid a huff of a laugh. 

“For what’s worth, I hate yours too,” he mumbled back, before they finally separated from the other and Percy turned back to Chiron with what he hoped was a determined gaze. “Like I said, I’ll do it.”

And Chiron nodded, slowly, respectfully. Percy let out a slow breath and wondered, not for the first time, when his luck would stop being so shitty. 

…

It hit Percy the very next day that the other schools had some kind of school uniform thing going on. Which they didn’t. 

Well, sure, they had their t-shirts, but they were more appropriate for the camp they were actually for, instead of a gathering of pompous magic schools. Honestly, Percy had gone to a lot of schools that were full of rich kids and none of them reached the level of this one. There was clearly some rivalry going on and it definitely wasn’t like the one between the cabins - sure, the one between the cabins could be even dangerous when capture the flag was involved, but other than that, they were quite civil, most of the time. 

“The other houses don’t like Slytherin much,” mumbled Annabeth that morning, while they walked around the castle’s first floor. 

“Sly-what?” repeated Percy, frowning, because what the hell kind of name was  _ that _ ? Were wizards okay? Did the magic fuck around with their brains to come up with those names? 

“I talked to Harry during breakfast and he and his friend Hermione explained to me how the classes and the houses work,” said Annabeth. 

Ah. That explained it. Percy wasn’t too proud of it, but he’d spent basically all breakfast, uh, for lack of a better word,  _ sulking. _ Some time later in the day, he would throw his name in the stupid cup that would then light it on fire like some kind bad omen and he would have to deal with whatever bullshit destiny or the other headmasters threw at him. Not the best plan for him. So, yeah, he hadn’t been in a too-good mood that morning. 

Instead of paying attention to Harry, Hermione and Annabeth’s conversation, he’d been watching with something close to interest as Ron tried again to get close to some of the Beauxbatons girls that were sitting at another table without tripping over his own feet. Needless to say, he wasn’t too successful. Percy almost took pity on him and stood up to maybe help him out of the hole he was definitely digging himself into, but he hadn’t needed to, because there was Piper, closely followed by Jason, who took Ron away with a small smile and probably a bit of charmspeak to keep Ron from crying out of frustration.

“How do they work, then?” he asked, and maybe he was a bit interested, if only because Harry was still his cousin and he studied and lived there, not to mention that they would stay at the castle for quite some months. 

“All the students get sorted into one of the four houses when they first arrive at Hogwarts,” explained Annabeth, with her eyes still roaming through the tall ceilings of the nearly-empty castle hallways. All the Hogwarts students were in class at the moment, and so were the Durmstrang students. They could still see some of the Beauxbatons looking around like them, though. “They are named after the four founders of the school.”

“If their names are as weird as all the other ones, then I’m pretty sure I’ll just forget them in less than a day,” he said with a rueful smile. Annabeth snorted. 

“Well, in any case, Harry and his friends are from Gryffindor,” she replied and yeah, that was another weird name that he was quite sure would disappear from his head by the end of the day.

“And the one they don’t like?” asked Percy, because, even if he was going to forget it, at least he could make  _ an effort _ , specially if it was people that could be (could be?) enemies. Or maybe he was just overthinking things. Not everyone was out to get them. Debatable, but still mostly true. 

“Slytherin,” said Annabeth. 

Percy was in the middle of trying to connect those names to some word or phrase that would make it easier on him to remember them, when they walked out of the hallway, just in time to arrive at some kind of- 

_ Wait a minute. Are those fucking stairs moving? _

“Guys, isn’t this amazing!?” came Leo’s excited voice, startling them out of their shock. 

Both of them looked up, just in time to see Leo jump down from a set of stairs overhead that was moving to the side and land just in front of them with the widest grin Percy had seen in  _ months. _

“Leo!” came Piper’s voice, and a few seconds later, Piper and Jason climbed up the stairs in front of them. Piper glared at Leo and hissed, “Don’t just jump off like that, not when there are people around.”

Her eyes moved slightly to the side and when Percy looked over, he saw a pair of Beauxbatons students staring at Leo with wide eyes as if he was some kind of ghost. Then again, Percy had seen the actual ghosts of the school, so maybe ghosts were more normal than he had thought. He still found it hilarious that Harry’s friends thought that their reactions to their school’s weirdest stuff were lackluster. If only they could see how they were reacting to the  _ moving stairs _ …

“Annabeth, isn’t this amazing?” chirped Leo, completely disregarding Piper’s hiss, and said girl could just rub her face with her hands while Jason patted her shoulder with a rueful smile. 

“It  _ is _ ,” breathed Annabeth, and she returned to looking around with wide eyes, mapping the place with just her gaze. Percy was sure that her fingers were itching for some paper and pencil so she could draw it. 

“You ain’t seen  _ nothing _ yet,” said Leo, closer and closer to just start jumping in place from the excitement that was clearly running through his veins. 

“Look at the walls,” said Jason, then, and even his eyes were bright like a child’s as he pointed at the walls around them. 

Percy and Annabeth turned to the opposite walls and then  _ gaped.  _

It was one thing to see moving photographs. It was another to see  _ living portraits _ that looked at them as if they were  _ actually seeing _ them.

“Oh, you’re students from one of those visiting schools, right?” greeted one of them, a man with a bushy beard and glassy eyes that stared at them with a monocle over one eye as if they were interesting subjects. “How are you liking Hogwarts?”

“I’m loving it more every hour,” was Leo’s bright answer and Percy could only open his mouth, before closing it, and then opening it again like some kind of idiot. 

After a few seconds where he couldn’t think of anything to say that wasn’t absolute gibberish, Percy managed to turn around to Leo, Jason and Piper with wide eyes. 

“What else you got?” he asked, and for once in his life, he didn’t fear for his life when asking that to  _ Leo. _

He did tense when Leo’s grin turned sharp. 

“I’m glad you asked, Mr Jackson, because Fred and George have shown me a good selection of secret tunnels we can choose from.”

…

They spent all morning running around the castle through secret passages that led to some weird places with some weird stuff that Percy knew better than to touch. For a short while, they were sure that they had been lost, but with the kind of life they had, it was obvious that they wouldn't panic. Not for  _ that _ , anyway. 

If Chiron asked them why they had disappeared all morning, they had planned to tell him that they had been searching for any clues all around the castle. It wasn’t a  _ total  _ lie, anyway. They did keep their eyes peeled for anything out of the ordinary. The problem was that they had no idea what  _ ordinary _ was in a magic school. They knew what wasn’t  _ ordinary _ when talking about mythology, but magic? That was another can of worms that, if they’d known better, they wouldn’t have opened. Alas.

Percy entered his name that afternoon, glaring at the goblet as a blaze of fire burned his name as soon as he had thrown it in, before reminding himself that flipping the goblet and smashing it to a pulp of metal or silver or whatever it was wasn’t worth it. 

They stayed watching as students from other schools entered their names with Hazel and Frank, so they had first-row seats to watch the Weasley twins try to break the rules and get in the tournament through illegal means. The aftermath was funny, in any case, and it actually kind of managed to get Percy to stop trying to set the goblet of fire  _ on fire _ with the power of his will alone. He could still maybe drown it? Would it be the goblet of fire then, under the sea?

And so, Percy was tempted to groan loudly when the time came to announce the champions. He still might have, if Annabeth hadn’t taken his hand under the table to give it a tight squeeze. 

He listened with half an ear as the champions of the other three schools were announced to the students at large and watched with distant eyes as the champions climbed the stairs with pride and excitement. And when Dumbledore finally said his name, Annabeth gave his hand another squeeze, before letting go so he could stand up, surrounded by a thunderous applause that sounded oddly muted to his ears. 

Maybe he should have been excited, maybe he should have at least  _ tried _ to smile or grin or- or s _ omething _ , instead of glaring at the goblet like it had insulted his whole family and shat on his bed. But the only thing he could feel was…  _ tired. _

_ At least _ , he tried to reason with himself,  _ not Annabeth nor Harry have to deal with this. They’ll be safe. _

As soon as he was side by side with the other champions, students no older than himself but that looked  _ so young _ to his eyes as they fidgeted with pride and excitement in the face of a dangerous tournament, the goblet blazed again. 

And Percy paused.

And when Dumbledore read aloud the new name of a champion that shouldn’t have been able to cross the damn age-line, Percy felt his blood freeze.

In the distance, he could feel a storm brewing. 

_ Motherfucker. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Funny "behind the scenes" thingy: at first, the champion was gonna be Jason, but then I had an epiphany and whispered "fuck". With feeling. Because Jason isn't 17 yet at this point. I'm sorry, Percy. You have to deal with all the shit again (even though making Hazel and Nico the champions would have been *hilarious*). Makes the tasks easier to manage tho.


	11. Champion of breakdowns

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It still amazes me that this story is getting so many kudos aikjsbhdcgb ALSO, I see all your comments, someday I'll reply I swear!! I see you all! I have my eyes on you!  
> (I was gonna update for my birthday but then I forgot. Of course. I have to stay on brand)

Harry had seen how quiet Percy had been all day, but he hadn’t asked. They were still… not that close, even if they were family, but Harry didn’t want to cross any line with Percy. He was the only cousin he liked, after all, not to mention that Harry was 100% sure that Percy was absolutely terrifying when mad. He didn’t want to see that. 

He had thought about asking him after dinner, see if he was okay or if something had happened back at home. Oh, no, were Sally and the baby okay? Paul? Was everything-?

But.

_ But. _

He hadn’t accounted to being chosen as one of the champions. He hadn’t even considered that because, hey,  _ he was four-fucking-teen years old. _

He still stood up when Professor Dumbledore continued staring at him, surrounded by silent students whose eyes were like sharp needles that pierced him as he walked up the steps after Hermione gently pushed him in that direction. 

Unconsciously, he moved closer to Percy, the only actual (probably) safe person in his vicinity. Or maybe not, because when Harry numbly raised his head to meet Percy’s eyes, looking for- for he didn’t know what, comfort, the knowledge that his favourite cousin didn’t hate him for stealing his thunder, _s_ _o_ _ mething -  _ all he saw was  _ rage. _

For a moment that felt a little too long to be real, Harry was afraid. He was afraid, because Percy was  _ furious _ and he was probably furious  _ at him _ , because he wasn’t supposed to be walking with them to the closed room where they would talk in private with the headmasters and the Minister and- 

But then it dawned on Harry that Percy wasn’t actually mad  _ at him _ , because Percy shared a sharp look with the headmaster from his school, before directing his fierce glare at Professor Dumbledore. Harry was still too numb with shock to actually  _ talk _ , but Percy finally grabbed his arm as they walked and pressed him tightly to his side as soon as they got to the room. Percy was standing between him and the other champions that were shooting confused and maybe annoyed looks at him, hiding him from the accusatory gazes of the Minister and the three headmasters (because Chiron seemed more considering than accusatory when he looked at him),  _ protecting him. _

“Harry is not of age,” was the first thing that anyone said in the room, and it was  _ Percy _ the one who said it. It took Harry a second to recognize his voice, as tightly woven with anger and worry as it was. The hand around his arm tightened until it almost hurt. “He shouldn’t participate.”

Professor Dumbledore’s only answer was a considering hum and Harry's breath caught in his throat.

“Harry, did you enter your name in the goblet of fire?” he asked instead. Harry’s brain needed a few seconds to process, but when he did, he hurriedly spluttered.

“O-of course not! Why would I-? I didn’t!” he said and he noticed a bit too late how he had been yelling, voice wavering with panic, hands shaking. 

The headmasters turned away, bending their heads so they could mutter between them. Harry could feel desperation claw its way up his throat. He was breathing too fast, wasn’t he? Oh, crap, he  _ was- _

“Harry,” called Percy next to him and his voice was much calmer than before, almost soft, and when Harry managed to turn his head to his cousin, Percy looked him in the eyes with controlled worry. “Harry,  _ breathe. _ ”

Yeah, easy for him to say-

But then Percy started counting under his breath, breathing deeply with his hands on Harry’s arms and Harry finally understood and tried to follow his lead, dragging oxygen into his lungs with less and less difficulty as the seconds ticked by. 

It took a few minutes, in which Harry tried  _ very hard _ to ignore the poorly hidden glances the other champions were throwing at him over Percy’s shoulders. But all it took every single time was a short glare from Percy to get them to stop staring and look elsewhere in the stupid room, full of useless junk that had been holed in there for years. 

By the time Harry had managed to get a hold of himself, the headmasters finally finished talking among themselves like some kind of obscure cult and turned to them. All Harry had to do to know what the decision was, was to look at Chiron’s tightly controlled frown and his tense hands on his lap. 

Percy cursed next to him. 

“Harry Potter will be the fifth champion,” came out of Professor Dumbledore’s mouth.

Harry could swear that his heart had stopped beating for a moment that felt like a year.

…

When they finally got out of the room, with the date for the first task fresh in their minds, the mess hall was completely empty. 

It had been probably the teacher’s idea, to avoid too much gossip running wild just before curfew, but Harry knew better than anyone else just how absolutely unstoppable it was. He could still feel thankful for it, anyway. 

Percy was still by his side, like some kind of guardian that didn’t stop glaring at the headmasters and other champions who looked at Harry too closely. Any other day, Harry would have snickered at their freaked expressions and how they rushed out the door as soon as they could, but he would be lying if he said that he wasn’t still reeling a bit because of the whole situation. He should have been used to stuff like this life-threatening shit that kept popping up every year like- like-

The headmasters ended up talking among themselves behind the teacher’s table, whispering and shooting each other pointed looks, but Harry let himself be led out of the hall by Percy’s hand still clenched around his arm. He was surprised to realize that he didn’t care.

Well, maybe they weren’t completely alone, because as soon as they entered the entrance hall, they found two silhouettes lurking in the dark. Harry was too tired to even jump, but it turned out that they didn’t even need to, because they were Hermione and Annabeth, who looked between the two of them with worry and confusion. 

“So?” prompted Annabeth, arching an eyebrow and crossing her arms over her chest. She was looking mostly at Percy, Harry noticed. 

“Harry has to participate, because he was 'chosen by the goblet of fire',” answered Percy, making air quotes with his free hand and rolling his eyes towards the next century. His voice was full of bitter anger and a fierceness that still surprised Harry, because it was because of what had happened to Harry, Percy cared about him, a  _ dumb orphaned boy who he’d only known for a handful of days _ , and he was still this protective of him?

“Any rules you can twist so he can get out of it without much fuss?” continued Annabeth, turning to Hermione with sharp eyes. 

“I’d have to check the library, but…” Hermione bit her lip and looked at Harry with worried and tense eyes, “if Professor Dumbledore said that he has to participate, that he  _ must _ , then…”

There was a tense silence between them. Harry was quite sure that his legs would give out under him at any moment, and he had never wanted a bed so bad in his life. Or, at least, a chair. There were dozens of chairs back at the mess hall, they could crash there for a while-

“Come with us,” said Percy, and it was only then that Harry noticed how Percy and Annabeth had been doing one of those silent conversations with their eyes as he’d tried to stay upright.

Percy and Annabeth led them outside and down to the docks and only when they were close to the boats did it hit Harry that they were heading to the magnificent trireme that would serve as the Apsídas students’ home for the next months. He should have been excited, he should have been interested, he should have been a lot of things, seeing as he was going to see the famous boat from the inside, but- he wasn’t. 

He watched with half a mind as Percy and Annabeth greeted the talkative Latin boy he had seen from afar who was working with what looked like a dozen of oddly-shaped gears and cables that were coming out from under the trireme’s deck. He didn’t catch his name, but then again, he wasn’t sure if they had said it at all as they headed below deck through a few narrow hallways, so different from Hogwarts’ towering ceilings that Harry couldn’t help but return to the present. 

And so, Harry and Hermione followed Percy and Annabeth to one of the doors at the end of a long hallway littered with doors left and right, each of which had some kind of distinguishing feature, like an owl, a lightning bolt or a literal gear tapped messily on it. For a moment, Harry wondered what that meant, until they passed through the one with the lightning bolt and they could hear voices muffled through the door and it finally hit him that, yes, those were the students’ rooms. 

Apparently, the room at the end of the hall was some kind of dining room slash living room, with a long table taking up most of the space, surrounded by tall windows that showed them a beautiful view of the Black Lake. Harry let Percy seat him on one of the chairs. He leaned on it heavily as soon as he could, closing his eyes with a long sigh and dropping his head on his crossed arms on top of the table. Hermione sat next to him; Harry could feel her worried gaze without even looking. 

“Where’s Ron?” he asked, and he almost regretted it and told Hermione not to answer that, but he could see it coming. The fact that Ron hadn’t reacted much when Harry’s name had been called, the fact that he wasn’t there with him  _ now _ was a dead giveaway. 

“He, uh…” was Hermione’s reply and Harry muffled a groan against his arms. Hermione sighed. “Give him time. He’s being an idiot.”

Harry didn’t reply. Silence fell between them once again and Harry wondered shortly where Percy and Annabeth had gone this time. They reappeared soon enough, each carrying two cups of something hot in their hands that they put on the table carefully. When Harry reached out for one of them, he blinked at the hot chocolate and his fogged glasses. 

Percy and Annabeth sat down in front of them, sipping at their cups, still silent. Percy was definitely still sending a murderous glare at one of the empty chairs, with his hands tightly around his cup. Annabeth, on the other hand, looked mostly thoughtful. 

“What if you surrender?” asked Annabeth. Her voice sounded so much louder in the room’s silence. 

“The Hogwarts students already hate me for being a nuisance to Cedric, the rightful champion,” said Harry, and he was surprised at how  _ bleak _ his voice sounded to his own ears. “If I surrender as soon as the first task starts…”

“Better alive than dead,” mumbled Percy under his breath. 

“Look, just… drop it, okay?” said Harry, finally lifting his head to send a pleading glance at his cousin, before dropping it again to stare at his cup like it contained all the secrets of the universe. “I’ll manage. Like always.”

Percy let out a long sigh, but he didn’t say anything else. Annabeth looked as if she was going to, but then Percy just touched her arm and shook his head slightly. Annabeth pressed her lips together, but didn’t say anything either. 

And then, the door opened and in came two other teenagers that Harry was quite sure he had also seen in the distance. The boy, tall and strong and probably Chinese, hesitated as soon as he saw the people spread around the table and took a good look at their faces. 

“Oh, sorry, we heard voices, so we just came to check…” he trailed off, looking more and more awkward as no one else spoke and just stared at him as if he was some kind of talking snake or something. 

“Are you okay?” asked the girl, looking at them all with her gold eyes. Harry saw Percy shake his head from the corner of his eye. He felt surprisingly grateful. The girl blinked at him, but then her eyes traveled to Harry and Hermione and a smile appeared on her face. “You’re Percy’s cousin, right? Harry? And I’m sorry, but I don’t know your name.” She turned her eyes to Hermione at that, before her smile widened slightly. “I’m Hazel Levesque. Pleasure to meet you.”

She hid how she elbowed her companion on the stomach.

“O-oh, and I’m Frank. Zhang. Pleasure to meet you as well,” greeted the other boy, sending a small smile their way. 

“I’m Hermione Granger,” continued Hermione, trying for a smile, but Harry wasn’t sure she had been successful. 

“Is there any more chocolate?” asked Hazel, already heading to a door that Harry guessed would lead to the kitchen. 

“A bit, yeah,” replied Annabeth. “Take it before Leo discovers it.”

“He’s too busy with his cables right now, I think,” said Frank and this time, his smile was more of a grin, amused and upbeat. “If you hear any explosions, don’t panic. It’s just him.”

“Or Jason,” pointed out Percy, and him and Frank shared amused grins. Annabeth sent a suspicious glance at them. 

“Does this have anything to do with what happened to that old TV we found at the Big House?” she asked, and when their only answer was a pair of innocent grins, she snorted softly and shook her head. “Honestly, I don’t know how you get Jason to do so much stupid stuff with you.”

“Jason is much more easy to convince to do stupid shit than you think, Annabeth,” came a new voice from the door, and when Harry turned around in his chair again to see who it was, he finally saw the Latin boy leaning against the doorframe, hands and face dirty with what appeared to be an interesting mix of grease and dust. “Anyway, did somebody say something about hot chocolate?”

“Tough luck,” said Hazel, coming out of the kitchen with a single cup of chocolate. “ _ I  _ have the last one of these.” Then she paused as she sat down and looked at Frank. “Unless  _ you _ want it?”

“Ah, no, it’s fine, you can have it,” said Frank, shaking his head with a small smile and maybe a blush? Hazel just shrugged and took a sip. 

“Aw, that’s too bad,” groaned the boy, who was probably the infamous Leo, now that Harry thought about it. Then Leo shrugged and a wicked grin that Harry had only seen on the Weasley twins’ face at their worst appeared on his face. “But maybe it’s for the best. I’m in the Zone, right now, anyway.” His eyes glinted. “I had this idea, that if I rearranged Festus’ motherboard and I redirected some of the wiring from-”

“Leo, we won’t understand what you’re saying,” interrupted Hazel with an amused smile. Then she shot a look at Annabeth and Percy snorted.

“Well, pretty sure Annabeth could understand it,” he said, sounding proud. 

Annabeth snorted into her cup. Hazel rolled her eyes so Harry and Hermione alone could see her doing so. Harry found himself smiling slightly for the first time since his name had been called at the worst possible moment just an hour before. 

“Anyway, if Chiron asks, I’m working on a masterpiece,” said Leo, still grinning, still looking like the perfect mad genius the Weasley twins were. 

“You’re pulling an all-nighter?” asked Annabeth, and when Harry turned back to her, she only looked interested, instead of maybe resigned, like Hermione tended to look when she learned of his own nightly adventures. Huh. 

“Hell yeah!” cheered Leo, before running into the kitchen, taking a few snacks and running back out again, humming some song or another that Harry couldn’t identify. 

“Won’t your headmaster be annoyed with him? You still have classes, right?” asked Hermione, frowning deeply and staring at the door. 

“Chiron is used to our bursts of action,” shrugged Percy, finishing his hot chocolate and standing up to carry his and Annabeth’s cups back to the kitchen. 

“Plus, we’re free to explore around here for the next few days, anyway,” nodded Frank. 

They fell into silence again and Harry found himself almost falling asleep, dropping his head on the table and smearing all his leftover chocolate all over the nice table. So, for once in his life, he decided that he  _ really _ needed to go back to his dorm and  _ sleep _ and hope that all this situation seemed a bit better in light of a new day. Probably not, but hoping was still free.

“You can stay here for the night, if you want,” offered Percy, as soon as Harry said as much. Harry and Hermione had probably looked at him weird, because he snorted softly. “We have a few unoccupied rooms that you can use. If you want to avoid trouble, that is.”

“Ah, it’s fine, I have-” started Harry, but then his hand found his bag and felt the empty space of his magic cloak. Hermione arched an eyebrow at his sigh. “Okay, no, I don’t have it.”

“Let’s just stay here, then,” was Hermione’s obvious answer and Harry found himself agreeing with her, if only because he was sure that he was ready to just sleep in the middle of the stairs. Gryffindor’s common room just seemed  _ so far away _ …

His room was, apparently, next to Hazel’s and across from Percy’s and the bed was so soft and so comfy or maybe it was just because he was at his limit, but as soon as he managed to get his robes off enough so he wouldn’t tangle himself in them in his sleep, he was out like a light. 

…

Harry woke up to the sound of loud laughter, a yelled curse in a language he didn’t get to identify and the calm tones of someone trying to get the situation under control.

He squinted at the sun coming from the small porthole above his bed and frowned at the unfamiliar blur around him, until he found his glasses thrown carelessly on top of his robes and he blinked at the now-familiar room at the trireme. With a pang of panic at not knowing what time it was, he made quick work of his robes and decided that, if he could, he would go back to his dorm to take his books and change his clothes because wow, was he looking like an absolute  _ mess _ , and  _ not _ the good kind. He was feeling like one too. 

He came out of his room more or less at the same time as Hermione and the both of them looked around at the people walking up and down the hallway. It was… more lively than he had expected the boat to be, honestly.

“Leo, if you’ve used my comb for another stupid experiment  _ again _ , I  _ will _ make you swim in the freaking lake-!” was yelling a dark-skinned girl a few feet away, glaring impressively at Leo and waving a weird object around. What was it called, cornucopia? Something like that.

“I didn’t! What would I even use it for?” was yelling Leo back, between cackles. “It’s not my fault you tend to misplace your stuff!”

“Piper, I found it! It was in the lamp!” came another voice from inside one of the rooms. "It's… not looking too good."

“ _ How _ did it get there, of all-?” shouted the girl, probably Piper, turning around and marching back into the room, while Leo laughed even harder. 

Harry and Hermione looked to the other side as they heard more people talking from there, close to the door leading into the dining room. Was that-? Yeah, that was Frank, right? 

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” he was apologizing, blushing profusely. The younger boy in front of him let out a huff of laughter and waved his hands in the air.

“It’s fine, it’s perfectly fine, we shouldn’t have startled you,” he was saying. Harry frowned at him. He was quite sure that he didn’t know him yet. He was blond and slightly tanned and he honestly couldn't place a name to him at all. 

“I mean, at least you didn’t stab us,” said another boy, next to the blond. He was the opposite of the other, with black lanky hair, skinny and pale. Harry could also hear an accent, but he couldn’t quite place it. 

“Good morning, did we wake you two up?” came Percy’s voice from in front of them and both Harry and Hermione turned to him like some kind of idiots. Harry didn’t know when, but both Percy  _ and _ Annabeth were in front of them. 

“A-ah, no, I don’t think so?” he managed to get out. Percy’s smile turned into a lopsided grin. “We need to go to class, anyway.”

“You still have a bit of time before breakfast, you should go change,” said Annabeth as she tied her hair into her usual ponytail. 

“We’ll do that, yeah,” nodded Harry, and after looking at Hermione and making sure that they didn’t leave anything behind, they turned to the exit. And then Harry hesitated, before turning around again to look at Percy and Annabeth. “Uh, thank you. You know. For yesterday.”

Percy’s grin softened and Annabeth gave him a small smile. 

“No problem. Cousins stick close,” said Percy. 

Harry grinned at him and turned around to deal with the shitshow that would probably be the whole day. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Catch me laughing about that "stealing his thunder" thing like an idiot.)


End file.
